


Shiro's Escape

by StormDriver



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst and Feels, Gen, Keith/Lance (Voltron) Angst, Pining Lance (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron) Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Shiro (Voltron) Has a Clone
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2019-04-04 19:17:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 36,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14026986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormDriver/pseuds/StormDriver
Summary: As a note, this story does not receive consistent updates, nor do I think it ever will. It's just too messy for me to piece it altogether so quickly with such little time to spare for it. The story is supposed to be about 10 chapters long, with each chapter having roughly 8,000 words. It's not a horrendously long read, but hopefully you can enjoy it ^^There is no real shipping in this story, it is NOT romantically oriented and I don't plan to make it such. There might be pining, if you interpret my writing that way, but I can promise there is nothing direct. I'm discourse-free, interpret my writing however you'd like. If I see any backlash on comments that are directed at me or at others, I will delete them and I will block you. This is a place for positivity and the freedom of creation.On top of that, acknowledge now that I am not going to mention any explicit actions between characters aside from physical violence that is usually present in the original source material, AKA the actual series "Voltron: Legendary Defender" on Netflix. There will be no sexual acts of any kind. The rating the story has is for viewer discretion of VIOLENCE, not sexuality.Now, to the cheesy stuff. Thank you for clicking this story, it means a lot to me that you're interested! I accept all forms of feedback, be it the keymashes of anger/excitement or intricate and analytical summaries. I love it when I can hear can from my readers, especially ones that are willing to get dedicated to what I write. With that being said, if you EVER see any kind of grammar mistake, or something seems inconsistent or hard to follow, do feel free to point this out! I want to make this story fun to read for everyone. So if something I wrote is difficult, I'd love to change it to something that everyone can understand. Sometimes when I write these chapters, I go off on tangents and completely forget what I was gonna write.





	1. The Red Paladin

**Author's Note:**

> As a note, this story does not receive consistent updates, nor do I think it ever will. It's just too messy for me to piece it altogether so quickly with such little time to spare for it. The story is supposed to be about 10 chapters long, with each chapter having roughly 8,000 words. It's not a horrendously long read, but hopefully you can enjoy it ^^
> 
> There is no real shipping in this story, it is NOT romantically oriented and I don't plan to make it such. There might be pining, if you interpret my writing that way, but I can promise there is nothing direct. I'm discourse-free, interpret my writing however you'd like. If I see any backlash on comments that are directed at me or at others, I will delete them and I will block you. This is a place for positivity and the freedom of creation.
> 
> On top of that, acknowledge now that I am not going to mention any explicit actions between characters aside from physical violence that is usually present in the original source material, AKA the actual series "Voltron: Legendary Defender" on Netflix. There will be no sexual acts of any kind. The rating the story has is for viewer discretion of VIOLENCE, not sexuality. 
> 
> Now, to the cheesy stuff. Thank you for clicking this story, it means a lot to me that you're interested! I accept all forms of feedback, be it the keymashes of anger/excitement or intricate and analytical summaries. I love it when I can hear can from my readers, especially ones that are willing to get dedicated to what I write. With that being said, if you EVER see any kind of grammar mistake, or something seems inconsistent or hard to follow, do feel free to point this out! I want to make this story fun to read for everyone. So if something I wrote is difficult, I'd love to change it to something that everyone can understand. Sometimes when I write these chapters, I go off on tangents and completely forget what I was gonna write.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance and the rest of the Voltron team, while attempting to overtake a stray Galran base, encounter a slight issue: the cruiser they're fighting has reinforced armor. Not even the jawblades of the Lions can pierce it. In an attempt to impress his teammates, Lance claims that the Red Lion is equipped with a weapon that might be able to pierce the armor, but is unable to connect with the Red Lion to spawn it. Lance admits his defeat and the team commits to using Voltron's sword, only to be shot down quickly by the cruiser. Voltron being disabled, Lance climbs out of his lion and tries to aid Shiro, who passed out during the fight. Realizing they can't take on the cruiser, the team flies back up to the castle and quickly departs.

Another raid. Another flight in the Red Lion. Another hot moment of tension as a gun's bullet trail ran up the side of the fiery beast, attempting to fell it. There was his target.

The Red Lion fell into a nosedive, its snout aimed straight at the Galran tank, the source of the bullets. Lance trained his gaze onto the heavy gun of the battle cruiser. It adjusted its cannons so all bullets were directed at Lance.  The purple bullets loomed ever closer.

Lance wasn't phased by the closing bullet trail. He just wanted a perfect shot. If the gun aimed straight at him, he'd have a better chance at laying a shot into the barrel, potentially blowing up the entire cruiser without much effort. He needed to be closer, and so did that barrel.

Red continued the dive. Bullets sprayed just centimeters away from its armor. His blue eyes narrowed as the shot lined up. His wrist twitched on the left stick, just itching to fire already. It was quiet for him, despite all the fighters in the air chasing his comrades. He felt alone. He was focused. He wasn't going to miss this shot. He wouldn't let his team down, not when he had a chance to end the fight early. 

Only a fraction of a second before he pushed on the trigger did the Blue Lion imbed itself in the Red Lion's side. The much heftier Blue Lion tackled the Red Lion to the side just as the bullets would've impaled Red. Somewhere over the comms, Allura groaned as the bullets struck her instead.

The Red Lion toppled and Lance shrieked as the two cats crashed into a mountain-side. Lance's head smacked into the back of his seat, giving him neck pains that would last him seven quintents. 

The two lions rolled down the hill and rest at the bottom. Blue eventually stood back up and laid eyes on Red. 

"Lance, are you alright?!" Allura yelled over the comms.

"My neck is broken, if that's alright." He replied sourly. "What the heck, Allura, I had a perfect shot lined up!" 

"A shot for what? The Galra to shoot you down?" Her scolding voice kicked in. Lance hated her scolding, but it wasn't worse than Shiro's. "If I hadn't hit you, that cruiser would have! We can't lose you because you're getting self-absorbed!"

Lance didn't even know what to say. He did want to shoot that cruiser down in one fell swoop, and possibly take all the glory with it. Maybe a few months earlier, he would've asked for a parade. Now, he just wanted her to stop yelling. 

Allura shifted in her seat. Lance's silence was never a good sign. He usually talked bombastically and with joy. But now?

"I'm sorry. I... I shouldn't have said that."

"Hey, uh, I realize you two are having a real deep conversation, BUT WE NEED HELP WITH THIS CRUISER!!!" Pidge's squeaky voice made Lance's ears bleed as she screeched. 

"ALRIGHT, alright!" Red stood back up and into the air, Blue just behind. The two lions soared, attempting to weave through the stream of bullets that penetrated the atmosphere. 

The Green Lion swooped across the ground, a blade in its jaw. The knife pierced the many fighters chasing the Yellow Lion across the ground. All the rest were soaring through the sky and laying down fire.

All the while, the Black Lion was hardly visible next to the massive cruiser. Its jaw blade, double-edged, was hardly making a dent in the armor. One of the many cannons attached to the side of the cruiser aimed at the Black Lion. A single, large pellet laid into the chest of the Black Lion, sending it sprawling across the battlefield. 

"Allura, get Shiro out of there, before it shoots him again! I'll go take out the fighters and buy Hunk some time!" Lance's fast-paced thinking had already led him into a dive halfway through his instructions. The speed of the Red Lion was greater than he was used to, even after having so much time to pilot the new cat. He was much too used to the gentle sways of the Blue Lion, and its large stature made him feel like a king on the battlefield. The Red Lion was tiny and quick, and much too enthusiastic for Lance's calmer movements. 

He was quick to aim and let loose a blue laser from the Lion's jaws. The blinding light penetrated the armor on the fighters and they exploded or crashed into the ground. 

"Whoa, how'd you do that?!" Pidge asked in a wild confusion. "Those things move way too fast for me to even track them!"

"Well, when your sharpshooter lands, he'll tell you all about it." He smiled a smug smile to himself. Somewhere over the comms, Pidge groaned. 

"Less bragging, MORE SHOOTING!" Hunk screamed. Pellets only got closer and closer to his lion. Yellow leaped over rocks and craters, but he couldn't get airborne without a bullet-hell raining down on him. 

Lance tried to shoot ahead at the fast-moving fighters. But every time he pulled the trigger, his shots would miss widely. All the movements of the Red Lion couldn't help him aim. "Pidge, I need you to draw the fire of the fighters off me and Hunk!"

Pidge muttered something about grammar before saying in her most tired voice, "And what are  _you_ gonna do?"

"S-something awesome, that's what!" He stammered and immediately regretted what he said. He heard Pidge sneer and taunt him that he didn't sound so sure. But sure enough, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the Green Lion's shield moving in front of the fighters and dragging their attention away from him and Hunk. 

The Yellow Lion skidded to a stop in the dirt. "Now would be a great time to do that awesome thing, Lance!" Hunk cried out. 

Lance stared at the battlefield, eyes trained on the fighters. He could only imagine the targets on every single one of them. If he could only hit them all at once, he wouldn't need to spend so much time trying  _not_  to hit Pidge. Voltron's shoulder cannon would work...

"Can we form Voltron to take these guys out?" Lance suggested.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME, LANCE?! I'M OUT HERE FLYI- _AGHH!"_  Pidge's rant was interrupted by her head smacking into the dashboard of her Lion. "I know... eghhhh... I know there's a lot of them, but YOU need to do something Lance! NOW!"

Lance began to panic. He fired wildly in the direction of the fighters. His lasers struck a few of them, but the rest just flew straight past his line of fire and kept chasing Pidge. A few began to tail back on Hunk, who had finally gotten into the air. 

He needed something to take them all out at once. It was gonna be a pain in the neck to try to chase every single one down. And considering how badly Pidge was fairing with dodging them, he didn't have time.

A memory flashed back. The first time they fought Zarkon. Or rather, the first time  _Keith_  fought Zarkon. It was insane, and Lance had to do everything he could to keep fighters off of Keith while he recklessly fought Zarkon himself. Lance still couldn't believe that Keith, in a Lion equipped with a jawblade, lasers, impeccable speed, and massive size couldn't take down Zarkon and one Bayard.

But one thing did bring their fight closer to fair: the Red Lion's Rail Gun. As soon as Keith broke it out, Zarkon fell into a defensive state. The only thing that could've blocked the Rail Gun would've been a Particle Barrier. 

That's what he needed. Its blast radius and range would be enough to take out all of the fighters. 

Lance stared down at the dashboard of the Red Lion. Its red lights were tainting his blue uniform a bright violet. His wrists were shaking as bullets from the fighters rained down on him and his friends. 

"How did Keith even get that thing to work...?" He asked himself. "Is there like a button?" His hands dragged across the control board and he looked for a button or something that said, 'RAIL GUN, PUSH ME, VERY LETHAL TOWARDS FIGHTERS.'

He slouched over in his seat and eyebrows furrowed. "C'mon, Red... We gotta help them!" He hoped the Red Lion would spring to life and show him the Rail Gun button. But it just hovered in the air at Lance's control.  

"I know I'm not Keith, but I'm your paladin now! You gotta show me SOME of your secrets!!" He crossed his arms. "How do you expect me to pilot you as awesome as Keith did if you don't tell me things?"

The Red Lion didn't respond. It just hovered.

Lance hunched over in front of the dashboard and examined the vitals of the lion. "Not talking still?" He sighed. Then rest his elbow on the dashboard of the Red Lion. He rose one eyebrow and gave Red a majestic look. "Hey Red, you got a map? 'Cause I am getting lost in your eyes."

The Red Lion still didn't respond.

"Are you a cat? 'Cause you are purrrrrfect!" His suave voice would've wooed anyone back home.

 But still, the Red Lion did not respond.

He was hesitant to say this next one, but he did anyways. "Hey, Red! Are you from outer space, 'cause your body is out of this world!"

Utter silence followed by Lance's sigh of defeat followed. "Lemme guess... Blue told you I said that, huh?" 

"LANCE, STOP FLIRTING WITH YOUR LION!" Pidge screeched. His ears bled again and he grabbed the shift sticks and sped forward after Pidge. 

"Red isn't listening to me! I can't use the Rail Gun!" Lance yelled back. He shot at a few fighters and they fell down one by one. But many still chased the two lions. 

"Rail Gun?! The Red Lion has a Rail Gun?" Pidge threw on stick forward and the other backwards, making her lion do a 180 spin. Lasers escaped its jaw before it quickly spun around and flew off. 

"Yes! Remember when Keith was fighting Zarkon?!" Lance fired more and more fighters plummeted. 

"We were  _all_  fighting Zarkon." Pidge muttered.

"No, the other time, when Allura was taken! Keith fought Zarkon himself and he had a Rail Gun!"

"He did? I feel like he would've mentioned that." 

"Do you even wear those glasses, Pidge? How could you NOT have seen it?!" 

"Sounds more like you were staring at Keith the whole time, Lance." Hunk chimed in. Lance groaned and banged his head against the pilot's seat. Pidge snickered to herself. "But aside from Lance's modesty of the guy he makes fun of... what Rail Gun?"

Lance blanked out. "You guys never saw that gun that Keith used?"

3 separate voices rang over the comms:

"Nope." Hunk shouted outright.

"Not at all." Pidge muttered. 

"Keith had a Rail Gun?" Shiro sounded confused.

Lance sighed and slouched over, his hands still grasping the shifts. 

"Wait, a Rail Gun?" Allura asked. "I believe my father had one when he piloted the Red Lion!" 

Lance stammered. "Th-then t-tell me how to use it!" 

"I'm sorry, Lance. My father never taught me how to use the Red Lion. He only taught me how to fly the Castle."

"Your dad taught you how to fly a Castle... but  _not_  his own ship?" Lance's tone was tipped with sarcasm. 

"That doesn't matter right now! How are we gonna take down the battleship?" Hunk interrupted just as another fighter crashed into his lion's jaw. 

"Direct attacks aren't working on it at all. Its armor is too thick." Shiro reported. "My jawblade couldn't even scratch it... In fact, the  _jawblade_  is damaged."

"If the empire is getting together cruisers with armor this strong, we gotta figure out how to beat it or we're gonna have to deal with whole fleets of these things." Pidge fired upon the cruiser again, but to no avail. "Lasers aren't even working on it!" 

"What about Voltron?" Allura asked. "Can Voltron's sword cut through it?" 

"Or maybe Lance's gun thingy!" Hunk interrupted excitedly. "Can you get that thing running, Lance?"

The newly crowned Red Paladin didn't respond very fast. "I can try." His voice was drenched in fear. 

"Well, try hard. We're not gonna last long with that cruiser constantly shooting at us." Shiro ordered."Everyone, draw the enemy fire away from the Red Lion!" Everyone understood and flew off to distract the fighters and the massive battle cruiser. 

Lance landed the Red Lion on the ground, no longer having to worry about the fighters. He tapped the dashboard, frantically searched for the bottom to or lever to activate the gun. He found thruster stabilizers, a power switch to conserve energy, oxygen-production, anti-gravity switch, cargo hold, but no Rail Gun. 

"Ah, come on!" He yelled. "What did Keith do to get you to use the stupid thing!?" 

"Lance, yelling at your lion isn't going to get you anywhere! You need to bond with it!" Shiro scolded. 

Lance cracked and yelled, "WE ARE BONDING!!!" 

Shiro yelled back, "BOND BETTER!" 

_That_  got Lance to shut up. Shiro never yelled unless he was really frustrated. Or scared. Or dying. A combination, sometimes. 

Lance gripped the shift sticks, his knuckles turning white underneath the black gloves of his paladin armor. His breathing was shaky. Sweat dripped from his face and he was turning red. He longed for the cool, cold air inside the Blue Lion's cockpit, but was trapped in the hot oven of tension that was the Red Lion. 

All he wanted was the Blue Lion. His favourite lion. His lion. The lion that chose him to be its paladin. The lion that rescued him from an avalanche on some snow planet. The lion he longed to pilot again. 

That lion was no longer his.

"Lance, what's wrong?!" Allura called to her friend. 

He was scared to even say anything, especially to Allura. His lover and the girl he loved. And the person that stole the Blue Lion from him. 

"LANCE!" Shiro barked. "Lance, are you alright?!" 

"I... I can't do it. Red isn't listening to me." 

The comms fell silent. Everyone seemed to stare at the blank space in their lions. It seemed hopeless for them to get anything done. 

Pidge broke their silence with a single command, "Well, then we need to form Voltron!" 

Lance was still paralyzed with fear, but everyone else nodded. Shiro spoke up, "Coran, can you draw their fire while we transform?" 

Coran, with his dashing orange mustache and fantastic battle strategy of shoot anything that isn't a lion, replied, "ALREADY ON IT!"

As if on queue, a giant blue laser broke through the upper atmosphere and penetrated the line of fighters soaring through the air. Aboard the Castle, Coran had assumed role of guy that shoots the main cannon.

Four of the lions had begun flying in formation, but the Red one was still rooted to the ground. Hunk was the first to notice and shouted, "Lance, are you sure you're alright!?" 

Lance shook his head and muttered, "Yeah. I'm fine." The Red Lion took off into the air at breakneck speed. It quickly caught up to the group and flew in unison with its fellow lions.

"Form Voltron!" Shiro's command triggered the Black Lion to roar. Its front claws receded inside its body and it stood upright. The red wings on its back spread further apart, almost like an angel's. The Red and Green lion's limbs folded away to its sides and attached to the sides of the Black Lion, locking into place. The Blue and Yellow lions folded upright and the Black Lion's back legs slid into the lions, locking into place. The lion's jaw dropped down and Voltron's eyes flashed a brilliant yellow light across the field. 

"We need to take down the cruiser before it starts targeting the Castle! Lance, form sword!" Shiro ordered. Lance took hold of the red bayard and jammed it into the console in the Red Lion, turning it sideways like a key would fit in a lock. 

The Red and Green Lions, or rather the right and left hands of Voltron, clanged together and a massive blue neon sword spawned between its arms. Voltron sped forward, with the sword in hand, toward the cruiser. 

All enemy fire turned away from the Castle and focused on Voltron. At first, the few bullets that hit the massive robot did little to nothing. But no one had seen the ion cannon fire yet.

There was no charge-up sound. No indication it would shoot. No real hint that there was even an ion cannon on the cruiser. Everyone just assumed the cruiser's best quality was its armor. They were right 10 seconds ago.

The deafening shriek of the ion cannon was enough to send Coran sprawling back from the console he was only watching from. The purple beam struck Voltron in the chest, a direct hit. Its life-draining energy coursed throughout the entire machine and the five paladins screamed.

The purple lightning didn't let up its grip until Voltron had skid across the ground for at least a mile. The most powerful weapon in the universe lay on the ground, utterly drained of energy. Its five pilots were struggling to just open their eyes. 

"Paladins! Allura! Can you hear me?" Coran yelled. There was no immediate reply, and so he yelled again, even louder. "CAN ANY OF YOU HEAR ME?!"

"Yes, we can hear you!" Hunk responded in a tired voice. 

"Won't be able to much longer, if you keep screaming like that." Lance muttered. 

"What happened...?" Allura was dazed. She shook her head and grabbed her arms. 

"We got blasted by... that cruiser." Pidge groaned, hugging herself. "I'm gonna be sick..."

"That's my job, Pidge, don't steal it from me!" Hunk barked. 

"Hey, Shiro." Lance called out. "Shiro, are you there?"

There was no reply.

"Shiro!" Lance called again. "Hey, answer me, man!"

"He must've taken the brute of the blast. I think he's knocked out." Hunk knocked on the dashboard his hand. "Guys, my lion isn't responding at all. You're down a leg."

"You're down two legs. The Blue Lion isn't online."

"I think we're all down..." Lance mentioned.

"Geez, why didn't we form the shield immediately? We should've guessed they would have something for Voltron specifically." Pidge scolded herself more than she did the team.

"We had no way of knowing. In all honesty, the fighters couldn't have hurt us as much once we'd formed Voltron. We were hoping to end it quickly." Allura's calm demeanor eased her fellow paladins. 

"We need to get moving again." Lance said. "Try to get your lions online, anyway you can!" He pushed the sticks forward and back, begging the Red Lion to react.

"What about Shiro?" Hunk asked. "We need him if we're gonna fight with Voltron!"

Lance didn't say anything. He stopped moving the sticks and stared at the dashboard. "Stay in your lions. I'll be back." He jumped out of his seat in the Red Lion and pushed open the doors to the cockpit with his hands.

"Lance, where are you going?" Pidge asked. She only heard the banging of doors through the comms. "You're not leaving your lion, are you? Its too dangerous out there!" 

"Yeah, I mean, what if Voltron falls apart while you're out there?" Hunk suggested. "You could get crushed by one of the lions!"

"Voltron is not gonna fall apart, Hunk. Its the most powerful weapon in the universe!" Lance scolded. He jetted up onto the side of the red lion, which was facing upright with Voltron's entire body laying flat on its back. 

"The most powerful weapon in the universe that forgot to use its shield..." Hunk chided. Pidge steamed and shouted:

"THAT WAS NOT MY FAULT!" 

"It wasn't anyone's fault! We were all eager to get the fight done and over with. We didn't know about the ion cannon, there wasn't anything we could've done." Allura reassured her friends. A tense silence fell over the four. 

Lance alternated between running across the side of the Red Lion and jetting across. He had nearly reached its shoulder when Coran announced to his friends, "I'm taking a lot of fire here! I'm going to need your help, paladins!" 

"Coran, we're out of comission down here. Our lions are busted and Shiro won't wake up." Pidge informed him.

_"Shiro_  won't wake up? Usually its Lance." 

"Hey, I've been getting better about that! Besides, Shiro was way more used to the Garrison schedule of getting up early! I... I just hadn't adapted yet!"

"9 months, Lance," Hunk reminded him. "9 months of you saying you were gonna get up REAL early so you can best Keith and then only getting up early if they were serving cinnamon rolls." 

Pidge start snickering in her cockpit. Allura frowned and asked, "What's a cinnamon roll?"

"Did you guys have NO luxury on Altea?" Lance asked, jumping a small gap between the Red Lion's shoulder and the Black Lion's torso. 

"Oh, we had lots of lovely delicacies. You already know of Coran's infamous paladin meal. I was hardly allowed to try it because Coran said it was specially prepared for the paladins only." 

Hunk frowned at the thought of the repulsive meal that Coran had tried to feed them that first week. "You weren't missin' much. Hey, when we get back to the Castle, I'll make some cinnamon rolls! They taste awesome, you'll love them!"

"Guys, we still need to get back to the Castle first." Lance continued his trek towards the head of Voltron. The mighty robot was a lot bigger from the outside. 

"Yeah, we know." Pidge muttered. She folded her legs on her seat and pushed on her knees. "But, real talk, where would we even get cinnamon? Did they have that stuff on Altea? Would we... find it at like a space mall or something?"

"Paladins, I can truly appreciate a bonding moment like all of you, but the Castle isn't going to be here if you don't hurry up!" Coran sounded desperate.

"Don't worry. I'm also to the Black Lio-AAH!" Lance slipped on a crevice on the Black Lion's neck and fell down. His head banged into the metal armor of the lion and he whimpered. 

"What happened?" Hunk asked.

"I just broke a tooth, I'm pretty sure." 

"Don't do that! You won't be able to have these "sinamen roles" that Hunk is going to make!" Allura happily yelled. 

Lance groaned and jetted back up to his feet. He had made it to the neck of the Lion and began climbing the side of its muzzle, next to Voltron's face. The metal creaked and groaned with every crevice Lance grabbed. Some gaps between the crevices were too big and he'd half to jump or fly up to the next. After a few slips and quick saves, he'd found himself on top of its muzzle, just below Voltron's crown. 

Lance slid down onto the blank eyes of the Black Lion. The bottoms of his shoes tapped the thick glass loudly. He was almost scared he'd crack the glass panes. He got on his knees and looked inside the eyes of the Lion, hoping to see Shiro in the cockpit. But it was all dark. 

Lance stood back up and was about to say something when Voltron's left leg began moving again. Hunk ecstatically proclaimed over the comms, "HEY, MY LION'S WORKING!" 

Lance, trying his best to keep his balance on top of the now moving robot, yelled back, "Don't move, I'm still on here!" 

The leg ceased movement immediately, followed by a quiet, "...oops." 

"I think the Blue Lion is coming online, as well." Allura said. 

"The Green Lion isn't working still. You guys must not have taken as much damage as the rest of us." Pidge speculated. "I guess that means Shiro is having it the worst." 

"I can't even see him in there." Lance said. 

"Don't tell me he's gone AGAIN!" Hunk complained. "We spent like a month searching for him in a bunch of broken fighters and destroyed Galra cruisers, I don't wanna do that again!"

"We didn't even find him the first time. Keith was the one who found him drifting in space." Pidge mentioned. "Are you sure he's not in there, Lance?"

"All I said was that I couldn't see him. I'll double-check." Lance stepped up onto the head of the lion and down onto the hatch on the top of its head. It opened at the sense of paladin armor at its entrance and Lance slid inside. 

He dropped onto a wall behind the cockpits entrance. Using the jetpack, he boosted himself up to its door and the door swung open. Shiro's unconscious body fell out of the cockpit and onto Lance's unsuspecting self. 

Lance screamed as the two got thrown back down to the wall. They banged into it and Lance groaned at the pain. Shiro's elbows poked Lance in the soft spots on his chest where the armor didn't protect, making him uncomfortable with nowhere to put Shiro in the meantime. 

He stared at Shiro's body, unmoving and showing no signs of life. His eyes were wide with fear that his friend might have died and was scared to even consider touching the corpse. But Lance didn't try to think about it. "Shiro's here! He's just... really tired." 

"Well, that's a relief." Allura muttered. "We need to get to the Castle, can you try waking him up?"

Lance boosted himself and Shiro up to the entrance to the cockpit and carefully shut the doors behind him. He wondered to himself why the doors didn't swing open when Shiro's body hit them but didn't ask. 

Lance didn't realize how heavy Shiro really was without Keith being their to drag him out of the infirmary or into the healing pod. Sure, he had his jetpack to propel them up, but Shiro was an entire second person being added to a jetpack only meant for one. And quite the hefty one. 

Lance managed to set his friend in the pilot's seat and had firmly planted his feet on the back of the seat as a means of staying near the front of the cockpit. Lance shook Shiro lightly on the shoulder and muttered, "Hey, Shiro, wake up."

He shook harder and spoke louder when Shiro didn't respond. But Shiro's body just lolled around with each jostle. His friend looked like he was in pain; eyebrows furrowed, nose wrinkled, teeth bared. The scar on his nose only seemed to extend on his face with every passing day. And even after Shiro had escaped Galra imprisonment, his hair was still growing white in the front. 

Lance asked himself a question he didn't think he'd ever have to ask: "Is Shiro still hurting after what happened, even when he's with us?"

None of the paladins could really imagine what Shiro had gone through. He had only told them bits and pieces of what he could remember, which wasn't a good sign. Shiro was either so traumatized by what happened that he forgot almost all of it or he's choosing not to remember because he doesn't want to. 

Shiro clearly hadn't told them everything. He was always vague when telling them about his time as a prisoner. He was captured with Matt and Sam, thrown into a gladiator match and forced to fight other aliens, detained and experimented on like an animal. He had his arm taken. But it was obvious something more was bothering him. Who knows what else he's lost?

No one ever pushed him to talk. And even though everyone was very curious as to what it was like, no one could bring themself to ask about such a hard time of his life. 

Lance took hold of Shiro's helmet and pulled it off his head. He had cut his hair differently ever since it grew out when he went missing. It was still the same undercut, but not so close to his head. He had cut his white hair especially short this time, which made it spike up a little bit. Lance smacked his face a bit, hoping the small pain would drag his friend out of the sleep. He almost regretted it immediately, as Shiro only looked to be in more pain. 

"Lance, how's Shiro?" Pidge asked. 

"He's not waking up. I think that ion cannon really hit him." Lance reported. 

"Then you've no choice. Lance, you have to pilot the Black Lion." Allura commanded.

Lance froze up. He almost dropped Shiro's helmet in disbelief. Hunk's anxious voice sounded over the comms. "C-Can he even do that?? I thought the lion needed to choose the paladin! We just went through this with Keith!" 

"Then we hope that the Black Lion accepts Lance." 

"G-guys, I know I brag a lot about being the most skilled p-pilot on the team," He stammered. "But I don't think I'm meant to pilot THIS lion!" 

"Lance, you have to try." Allura reiterated. "Look, I've got an idea. Voltron can still move with just the legs, but we need the head to guide us to where we need to go. If Coran can lay down some cover fire while we run for the ship, we'll be safe there." 

"Allura, are you sure we can do this? It might be easier if we just separate into lions and fly Shiro out of here." Pidge asked. Even though she was fighting this plan, she was preparing for take-off.

"I don't think Voltron is going to easily break apart when 3 of the lions are offline. Please, just trust me." Allura pleaded with all her heart. And Pidge found it very hard to say no. 

"Okay, alright. I'm ready when you guys are. Main thrusters are good to go." Hunk ran his hand across the dashboard, reading his lion's steadily increasing vitals.

"I'm ready, as well. Lance, its up to you." Allura sounded confident.

Lance pulled Shiro out of the seat, but tethered his friend to the chair with a rope so he wouldn't fly out the door. Lance laid into the seat, letting the gravity push him into the chair. His arms were hardly long enough to reach the stick shifts in this lion. He wondered how Keith had managed to do it. 

"I know I'm not Shiro... and I know I'm not Keith." Lance stared longingly at the purple lights on the dashboard of the lion. "But you helped Keith once... and you let him be your paladin. All of it was to help Shiro.... So, do you think you can do the same for me?"

The lion didn't respond at all. The eerie purple light in the cockpit only made Lance feel glum. 

"There are fighters incoming. Lance, we need to move now!" Pidge yelled. "We don't have anything to defend ourselves with, we NEED TO MOVE!" 

Lance's eyes were wide, staring in disbelief at the dark cockpit. It wasn't fair. The Black Lion helped Keith save Shiro. Why wouldn't it help Lance save all of his friends? He sighed and shut his eyes, tight. He wanted to leave the Black Lion and go straight back to Blue. She wasn't nearly as big as the Black Lion. Black was built for someone commanding and respectful. Blue was roomy and kind. She at least responded to what he said.

Lance opened his eyes again and muttered in his most suave, pompous voice he could manage, "Do you have a name, Black Lion, or can I call you mine?" 

Lance swore he heard a voice, something, coming from the Black Lion, maybe chuckling. He immediately shouted, "Was that it?! Did flirting with you work!?"

"No, it didn't, Lance." Shiro laughed weakly, barely awake. "That was absolutely horrible." 

"SHIRO!" Lance gasped and spun around on the seat, grabbing his friend's shoulder. But before he could pull Shiro up into the seat to take his place, Shiro said to stop.

"I can't pilot. My eyes are too blurry and my head is... not okay. You need to pilot this lion." Shiro sounded dead-inside, like the ion cannon had just carved out any happiness Shiro might've had left in him. 

"The Black Lion doesn't like me. I'm not its paladin." Lance slumped back into the seat, depression rolling into his heart.

"You don't need to be a lion's paladin to pilot it." Shiro muttered. 

It was almost like Shiro had managed to reach a secret power button hidden behind the seat of the Black Lion. The dashboard hovered online, the purple light spreading quickly throughout the cockpit, illuminating the area. Voltron was powering back up. 

"How did you do that?!" Lance laughed, grabbing the stick shifts. 

"I'm its paladin. I'm here. What else does it need to start up?" Shiro almost laughed like it was a joke. 

"Lance, I'm regaining a visual. Is the Black Lion operational?" Allura asked. 

"Yep. And so is Shiro." 

The Blue and Yellow lions activated thrusters and Voltron began to stand back up. Its arms were limp at its sides, but unnecessary if they weren't engaging in combat. It was one thing they were mostly certainly trying to avoid.

"Coran, we're heading for the Castle!" 

"On it! Dropping Particle Barrier in your sector! Make it quick, you'll only have a few ticks!" 

The Blue and Yellow lions applied all the front force needed to get Voltron airborne, but Lance had to do all the steering. Voltron was much harder to guide with pinpoint accuracy than a laser was. 

He spotted the Castle hovering up in the clouds and the few cruisers and hundreds of fighters surrounding it. The particle barrier held strong. 

"Okay, we're almost there!" Lance called out. "Coran, get ready to drop that barrier!"

Pidge was watching with worry from her dark cockpit. She couldn't see anything that was going on as her lion was still offline. So all she tried to do was visualize the scenario: Voltron speeding towards the Castle and safely docking in one of the bays. Hopefully no fighters would follow them inside.

She realized their flaw. "Wait a minute, are they any docking bays in the Castle that are big enough to hold Voltron?!"

The four paladins fell silent. Allura had a look of horror on her face immediately. Hunk only asked, "How important is that?"

"Well," Coran chimed. "Considering we need Allura to power the teludav to get us out of here, and she needs to be able to dismount from her lion to get in here, YES, ITS IMPORTANT!" Coran slid in front of one of the other consoles and prepared to drop the particle barrier. "I see you in the leftmost sector of the Castle, lowering particle barrier now! You have 10 ticks!"

"Allura, Hunk, I need full thrusters now!" 

The two paladins pushed down on their stick shifts and blue flames ejected from the thrusters on the legs. Voltron sped faster towards the open space in the barrier.

"GUYS, WE NEED TO LAND VOLTRON SOMEHOW! I can't detach at all, my lion is still offline!" Pidge yelled, worried. She fiddled with the sticks shifts of her lion, hoping it would move.

"How can your lion still be offline yet the Black Lion is totally fine?! That doesn't make sense!" Lance barked. 

"Maybe 'cause Shiro took the worst of the blast? I don't know! But the Green Lion is still offline!" 

Lance guided Voltron through the small gap in the particle barrier. The shield closed behind them, quickly to any fighters following. The few that didn't pull up in time crashed into the barrier and exploded. 

Voltron halted directly next to the castle's center spire. Coran could see its face just outside of the control room's windows. 

"Hunk, can you maintain Voltron's stability on your own?" Allura asked.

"Uh, I might if Lance helps with the Black Lion, but-" Hunk tried to think of the required force and what angles they'd need to be projected at to keep Voltron airborne.

"Good, I'll be back once we go through the wormhole!" Allura shouted. At first, nothing happened, but Voltron's weight suddenly shifted entirely to the right side, as if the right leg had disappeared. Lance threw the right stick forward and engaged thrusts on the right side of Voltron, keeping it steady. 

"Allura, what just-?" Lance looked out the eyes of Voltron and saw the Blue Lion flying towards its hangar. She had completely detached from Voltron.

"It will be one dobash, paladins! Hold on!" Allura panted as she began her run through the Castle to the control room. 

"What's going on...?" Shiro asked. Lance quickly realized he hadn't given his friend his helmet back and stood up from his seat to get it. It had rolled into the corner of the Black Lion's cockpit. 

"Well, Allura just detached completely from Voltron and now we're having to work on our own here." He gave the helmet back to Shiro, who didn't try to put it back over his head. He just held it close enough that he could hear Hunk's panicked voice through the radio.

"Ah, AH AH! LANCE, YOU'RE PUSHING TOO MUCH!" 

"What do you mean, too much? I'm doing what I have to so we don't fall over!"

"No, you're thrusters are way too strong, you gotta turn them back down!"

"Why don't you turn yours up even more, then?"

"Because the Black Lion has way more power than the Yellow Lion! I can't match its power!"

"Paladins, are you ready to jump?!" Allura yelled in an extremely tired voice.

"YES, PLEASE!" Pidge yelled as loud as she could in her dark lion. 

A wormhole opened up in front of the Castle, which moved quickly inside. Its gravitational pull dragged Voltron along with it. They fled inside the wormhole so fast, not a single fighter had managed to fly in after them. 


	2. The Yellow Paladin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Post-escape from the Galra tank, the paladins settle down and hope to get some rest soon. Ever since Lotor's takeover of the throne, they've hardly had to worry about massive Galra troops ambushing them. But this troop certainly did more damage than they'd expected: Shiro's arm has ceased functioning. After a quick meal with the rest of the castle's population, they agree that perhaps they all need a break. Lance, Hunk and Coran decide to go to the space mall in search of delicacies to stock their practically empty fridge while Pidge stays behind with Shiro to figure out what happened to his arm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS IS A SUPER FLUFFY CHAPTER. Like, next to nothing plot-wise happens in this chapter. I mentioned that I wrote this specific chapter the night after season 4 dropped. Well, that night, I was hit with a ton of thoughts of suicide and death and etc. and I needed to calm myself down somehow. For some reason, and I guess I should've expected this, writing about the pudgy, smiley-face, yellow paladin Hunk is a good cope ;D Such a good boy! I love Hunk so much and I can't wait to see what more he gets in season 6! I really REALLY loved him in season 1 and I hope he gets more of that love soon.   
> So, yeah, reiteration, SUPER FLUFFY CHAPTER. This is gonna feel like a filler, anime episode, so consider it one. You can completely skip this chapter if you'd like, I did include a summary.

Hunk had to tow the Red Lion into its hangar, as Shiro was still unable to pilot his lion and needed Lance's assistance.

The Yellow Lion wrapped its claws around the much smaller Red and dragged it off of Voltron, which was just the Black Lion at that point. Red detached from the joint with just a few shakes and its legs fell out from its sides.

"Allura, are you gonna be okay?" Pidge's voice rang over the radio.

"Yes, I'm fine..." She sounded like she was panting. 

"Allura," Lance chipped, "You booked it across an entire Castle and powered a teludav, you're gonna need rest." 

"We ALL need some rest." Coran muttered. "Paladins, get the lions into their hangars. We're going into rest mode until everyone is ready."

"Contact the Blade of Marmora," Shiro's voice was frail. "Let them know about the tank cruisers. The Galra have to have more of them and we can't risk losing anymore allies." His commands were weak, prompting worry in all of his friends. 

Hunk hadn't thought much about how Shiro was until he heard his injured friend himself. "We'll do that. Get some sleep, Shiro. You sound beat."

"Alright..." He moaned.

"Don't worry, I'll make sure he's okay." Lance reassured.

Yellow gently laid the Red Lion in its hangar. Red still didn't move or give any indication it was operable. It was limp on the metal floor.

Yellow slowly flew out of the hangar and over to its own. It landed gently on the ground and lowered its jaw to the floor. Hunk walked down out of its mouth and pulled his helmet off his head. "That was something..." He muttered, speculating the fight that occurred mere minutes ago.

Hunk made it to the hallway connecting the five hangars and tapped the button on the elevator. There was a low rumble as the elevator moved down the shaft, but another noise that wasn't familiar. It wasn't even coming from the elevator.

The yellow paladin swiveled and saw something moving down from the Black Lion's hangar. Lance uttered something under his breath as he dragged Shiro across the metal floor. Shiro's legs were limp and he had one arm slung over Lance's shoulder. It was an awkward hold, since Shiro was taller than Lance.

"Hey, is he okay?!" Hunk ran over to the two paladins.

Lance looked up from the floor, surprised that someone was even in the hangars. Before Lance could ask, Hunk had already dove underneath Shiro's other arm and pulled the other half of his body off the floor. "I was lending him a hand out of the lion when he fell down the ramp. Didn't respond to me at all." 

"He's... probably just really tired." The two trudged on through the hall and Shiro's boots scraped the floor.

"So... you want your chef to make cinnamon rolls?" Hunk asked with enthusiasm.

Lance didn't make eye contact. "I dunno...."

"Not hungry?"

Hunk stared at his friend, hoping his gaze would prompt a response from his friend. But Lance maintained eye contact on the door. 

"Hey, Lance?" He still didn't respond. "Lance, are you okay?"

"I'm fine." He snapped. "I'm..."

"...worried?" 

Lance hesitated to say anything more, but dragged his gaze away from the door to Shiro. "Why did he pass out again?"

"He's been working really hard lately. I wouldn't be surprised if he hasn't been getting a lot of sleep." 

The elevator door dinged open and the two shifted inside with Shiro between them. Shiro moaned when one of his legs twisted under the other.

"Hunk, watch where you're moving!" Lance hissed.

"It's not my fault!"

The door slammed shut and the elevator began moving up. Hunk fidgeted a bit. The silence was awkward. But Lance seemed content the whole ride up. Hunk wanted his friend to talk, but was afraid to try when he was so upset. The elevator doors opened to the familiar hallways of the dorm rooms. Lance started to pull Shiro's body out of the elevator.

Hunk didn't want to say it, but he did:

"Maybe you should go get some rest, too. I'll take Shiro to his room."

"You sure?" Lance responded immediately, turning his head to give Hunk a look of sorrow. "Can you carry him on your own?"

"I'm stronger than you, man. Go on, get some sleep. I'll ring a bell when food is ready." 

Lance was hesitant but eventually did drop Shiro's arm. Hunk felt the shift in his weight and pulled more on Shiro to keep him from slipping to the floor. The elevator dinged open and Lance walked down the hall, alone.

Hunk watched him walk off and turned to the opposite direction. Shiro was starting to slip down to the floor, but Hunk was going to drag him to his room even if it was by his arm.

The door opened easily and Hunk let Shiro sink into the bed on the wall. His body lolled over and his arm fell on his chest. He was still dressed in the paladin armor. Hunk propped him into the bed, his head on a pillow and limbs on the mattress. Some of his white hair was stuck to his face.

Hunk sighed and stared at Shiro for a moment. He leaned against the wall next to the bed and pondered what could've happened to the black paladin to make him faint twice. Hunk, prior to being shot by one, had no idea what an ion cannon was really capable of. They'd avoided being shot by one at all costs. The Particle Barrier for the castle could only sustain a few shots before it'd go down. And Voltron's shield wasn't much stronger than that.

Did an ion cannon really have the power to trigger an EMP on any target it hit? Or was that even an ion cannon? The legs were the first parts to come back, followed shortly by the Black Lion and the Green Lion. Hunk couldn't think of any kind of EMP that would only trigger via burst effect, where the closest to the blast radius were downed the longest.

If the straight-forward beam of the cannon had such a strong effect, Hunk was regretting thinking if the cannon had hit the Castle and how fast it might've plummeted into the crust of the planet.

"Did you say... you were making cinnamon rolls?" Shiro muttered. Hunk stepped off the wall and stared at Shiro. "Haven't had those in a long time."

"Shiro, are you okay?" Hunk asked frantically. Shiro was struggling to keep his eyes open. He pushed against the bed to sit up, but grabbed his torso immediately, cringing at the pain.

"I'll live..." He bit through his teeth. "Just... blood-rush. Sorry I scared you." His eyes looked tired. 

"It wasn't really me. But I know Lance'll be happy to see you're awake." Hunk tried to cheer up his leader.

"Did you... contact the Blade of Marmora?" It was a struggle for him to get out the words. "Or the Coalition?"

"I'll tell Pidge and we'll get on that." Hunk began a trek for the door.

"Wait!"

He froze and spun around. Shiro didn't yell often. And definitely not desperately.

"Can you...." He tried to take in as much oxygen as he could before spitting out, "Can you bring me a cinnamon roll?"

Hunk was a little shocked. Shiro didn't eat too often. In fact, did Hunk ever see Shiro eat since he got back? He had to have been eating, he'd be dead otherwise.

"Sure." The warm smile made Shiro smile back. The door shut automatically.

Hunk tapped the elevator key and sent it to the kitchen floor. He hadn't bothered to take off his armor, he wanted cinnamon rolls, now. As soon as he walked in the door, however, he stopped at the sight of Coran and Allura at the counter.

The two Alteans stared longingly at Hunk, who was just frozen in place. Allura smiled and said, "Hunk! So glad you could make it! Welcome to the kitchen!"

Hunk blinked with an absent look. "I know this is the kitchen. This is practically my domain."

"Of course it is." Coran guided his friend up to the counter. "Now, we Alteans, scourges that we are, have never heard too much about the treats and wonders of Earth. We were wondering... what exactly is a 'sinamen role'?"

"Is it some sort of important job that one is tasked with? Is sinamen a liquid or some sort of plant? Is it anything like the "milkshakes" that Kaltenecker makes?!"

Hunk pushed Allura away from his face the closer she got. Her bright blue eyes were full of curiosity. She, too, had neglected to take off her armor anymore than the helmet. But she had let her long hair flow down her back.

"Well, it's not 'sin-ah-men,' it's cinnamon. And they're not actual roles or jobs or anything. They're just little pieces of bread."

"What's bread?" Coran asked.

Hunk sighed. They really didn't know anything about Earth. Then again, none of the paladins knew anything about Altea.

Instead of answering their questions, Hunk went straight to work. He whipped up the dough and put it on the cutting board in a large, thin rectangle. Like Pidge and Lance had said, they didn't have any cinnamon in the cabinets. But he did come across a few spices that spell like chocolate and hazelnut. There was a third that was very similar to cinnamon. He asked if any of those spices were poisonous. Coran said that only if they got mixed with paltinepper, which Hunk was lacking in his recipe.

He mixed the spices together and layered the dough evenly with the dust. He rolled up the dough into a spiral and cut the dough into multiple small rolls, planting them in the oven to bake. Hunk was thankful that Kaltenecker was a cow that provided milk. They'd been stocking up on some for Allura and Coran's cravings and Hunk had been making some butter on the side.

Hunk worked fast and made the cream-cheese frosting for the rolls just as the oven dinged and indicated they had finished baking. With an oven mit on, despite still wearing his heat-resistant armor, Hunk pulled the treats out of the oven and frosted them.

"I present," He pulled the plate around to the front counter and set it down. " Cinnamon Rolls: Altean Style."

"They smell wonderful!" Allura commented. She reached down and picked one up between her gloved hands, raising the treat to her mouth. She bit down on it. At first she didn't react, just enjoying the sensation. But when that sensation turned into a burning hot fire in her mouth, she ducked her head under the counter and frantically spat out the delicacy.

"Allura!" Coran patted her back as she coughed.

"Whoooa, I didn't put anything spicy in these things, what's going on?!"

Allura smiled weakly at Hunk, her lips cracked. "That was my fault. I should've asked if they were still hot." The other half of the roll was laying sideways on the counter. Hunk picked it back up and set it on a napkin. "I'll wait for it to cool this time."

Lance and Pidge were called into the kitchen and everyone had sat down to enjoy some of the rolls. Coran had frosting in his mustache, bleaching it white. Pidge laughed and said that the frosting on Allura's cheeks looked like some kind of Altean marking. Lance had eaten at least two whole cinnamon rolls in under a minute, a testament to his sweet tooth. Hunk was already working on a second batch for later.

"Last cinnamon roll! Who gets it?" Lance yelled ecstatically.

"Well, certainly not you." Pidge scoffed, wiping some of the frosting off her face with a napkin.

"Don't eat it. I'm gonna give it to Shiro." Hunk ordered, flattening out the dough onto the counter.

"Shiro likes cinnamon rolls, too?" Allura asked. "Were these a customary food on Earth?"

"I dunno if they were customary, but they served them at the Garrison every other week on Fridays. Every cadet got two rolls for themselves."

"Yeah, and while Hunk's are definitely more tasty, they were better than everything else they made." Pidge sighed. "I'll admit, I probably snuck into the kitchen and stole a few for later."

"Pidge, you're crazy if you think you were the only one."

Lance and Hunk snickered as Pidge hid her head in embarrassment. They were always curious as to what Pidge would do when she would sneak out of the dorms. They always found her either heading outside, they assumed for fresh air, or into the kitchen. In fact, their following was what really led them to find Shiro after he'd crash-landed on Earth. It was a good thing Pidge snuck out all the time.

"So... these are more of a privilege than just a regular meal?" Coran asked.

"Oh, yeah. If you had too many of these things at once, you'd probably get sick." Hunk informed the two. "I dunno if that's a thing they had on Altea, eating too much and getting sick 'cause of it. But it was the one thing that really kept us from having them too often."

"That's a real shame. These taste amazing! I'd love to make a full-course meal out of them." Coran stared at the single cinnamon roll left on the plate.

"Ohhh, pleasssse." Lance's mouth watered at the sheer thought of a cinnamon roll banquet. "I'd love it...."

"Well, we may not be able to have entire meals with these treats, but I bet we could make something truly special tonight!" Allura suggested. "We haven't eaten as a proper 'family' in a long-while, not since the Castle started flying."

Hunk picked up the plate while everyone was busy talking about a potential banquet for later. As much as he wanted to chime into the conversation and offer up his culinary skills, Shiro needed something to eat and drink.

Before he opened the door, Hunk tapped it with his hand twice. Shiro's muffled voice said, "Come in."

Shiro was sitting on his bed, upright. He'd taken off the top part of his armor and slipped on a shirt, but he still wore the boots and belt around his waist. He looked much better than when he'd been dragged in.

Hunk walked up to Shiro and handed him a small plate with the last cinnamon roll on it. "Sorry, the others ate the rest. I'm working on a second batch that'll be ready in like 10 minutes."

"No, this is fine." Shiro took the plate and set it on his thigh. "Thanks." With his flesh hand, he picked up the roll and took a bite of it. A small smile cracked on his lips and he savored the flavor. "Way better than back home."

"Here, brought you this, too." Hunk handed him a cup with some ice water in it. Shiro grabbed it and muttered another thanks. He proceeded to drink half the cup in one breath.

"'Kay well, if you need anything else, don't be afraid to yell." Hunk said. But before Hunk could even make a move to walk out of the room, Shiro set down the cup and asked for him to wait.

Hunk turned back to his friend, who was holding the cup and the plate steady with one hand. Shiro broke eye contact and looked down at his other arm. "I, uh... Do you know anything about prosthetics or...?"

A set of dread settled in on Hunk's heart, but he forced himself to walk forward and sit down next to Shiro so he could take the arm and examine it. Shiro hadn't made an effort to move the arm himself, which wasn't a good sign. The arm jostled limply each time Shiro or Hunk shifted on their seats.

Hunk successfully bent every piece of the arm forwards and backwards to check that it was still fully flexible, and it was. "What's the issue here?" Hunk looked up at Shiro.

"I can't... move it. It's just stiff." Shiro stared at his metal fingertips, as if urging them to move. But they didn't yield.

"Might've been that something short-circuited when you got hit by that cannon. Something probably just overloaded. I can try to fix it, but I think Pidge would do better. Want me to get her?"

"Sure." Shiro nodded. He was much more awake now. His eyes were bright again and his hair was no longer stuck to his face. His stature was straight and he could at least move again. Well, most of him could move.

Hunk came back down to the kitchen to find Lance scribbling on an electronic pad as Allura listed off things to him. He'd come back in time to hear, "-peples, Selurian Lillies, and possibly some Oltion Harberries. Those aren't native to Altea alone, so you should be able to find them at the mall!"

"Awesome! Okay, me, Pidge and Coran will head there now! Oh, this is gonna be SWEET!" Lance fist-pumped the air. Pidge took the writing pad from Lance and looked at the list herself.

"I don't even know what half this stuff could even look like, but rohapple sounds like some spin-off of apple cider and that stuff tastes awesome." She got off her seat at the counter and laid eyes on Hunk. "Hey, we're gonna go to the mall again to get some stuff for dinner!"

"Well, uh hold on. Pidge, Shiro needs your help with something." Hunk grabbed hold of her arm before she could run past him. But before Pidge could complain about going out, Hunk said under his breath, "Shiro's arm isn't working at all."

Pidge straightened up and adjusted her glasses. "Did you check if it could move completely? It might've just been dented or damaged during a fight."

"No, that's the thing. I think the cannon that shot down Voltron hit Shiro's arm, like an EMP or something. It might have shredded a few circuits, but I didn't see any kinda physical damage on it."

Pidge stared longingly into Hunk's worried eyes before sighing and said, "Alright, I'll see what I can do. But that means you need to go with those two maniacs and supervise them." She pointed behind her at Lance and Coran who had already begun talking ecstatically about whatever they'd had planned.

Pidge descended down into the elevator to the dorms while Hunk, Coran, and Lance had saddled up in a pod and taken off towards the 'swap-meet,' as Coran called it. Allura had announced she'd be taking a nap and fell promptly asleep on her bed.

Lance sat alone in the back of the pod, muttering about how it was unfair that Hunk called shotgun. Hunk was finally happy to sit up front, considering he'd followed the rules of shotgun etiquette.

"Alright, we'll get there in a varga at this speed. Start reading off the list again, so I know what we're looking for." Coran handed the writing pad to Hunk.

Hunk scrolled down to the first item and read through Lance's terrible hand-writing: "Zolicoin, uh... Cru-sah-ly flowers?? ....Nahn Cub root..."

Hunk tried to read the list throughout the rest of the varga, but Coran, half-way through his reading, took it back and set it down, saying Hunk had done his best. Hunk just slumped in his seat and pouted.

The mall wasn't too busy. In fact, it looked like it'd hardly changed since they had last been here.

"Alright, an awful lot of this is on the easy-to-find list. But these three, right here," Coran pointed at three circle items on the list. "These are a bit tricky to find, especially since they don't grow organically anymore. You'll have to find a vendor that sells them, and for cheap."

"Coran, we're broke." Lance commented.

"Then how in the world did you buy that stress-inducing machine that you use and scream at every night?"

"You mean the console? Uh..." Lance rubbed the back of his neck. "I sorta went fountain-diving with Pidge to get together enough money."

"You stole money from a fountain?" Hunk didn't think even Lance would stoop so low.

"Uh, I don't think we're ruining too many wishes." Coran reached into his bag and handed Lance and Hunk each a coin satchel. "Now that's about 1400 GAC all-together. If you need to bargain to get the materials, you'll need all the money you have to bet. We'll meet back here by the fountain in two vargas, alright?"

Lance and Hunk nodded, each of them stuffing their currency in their pockets. Coran tread off to the marketplace with a giant bag to carry all of the goodies. Lance sighed and took a look at the list again. "Okay, he said that kelper leaves should be our priority to buy. The plants they come from apparently die just a few quintants after they're planted. So the leaves are really expensive."

"Great, what do they look like?"

"He wrote, 'orange outline with dark-green veins. Found commonly with marko-melons.' You know where any melons are?" Lance looked up at his friend.

"Maybe...." Hunk circled around at least 3 times before finally pointing in a seemingly random direction. "Maybe over there???"

The two wandered for about 10 dobashes before coming across a stand of melons that sold both herbs, fruits and, of course, melons.

Hunk pushed melons to the side to get a closer look at all the leaves they had. But before he could really check them, Lance grabbed his shoulder and asked, "Why not just ask the vendor?"

"Oh, well, I wanted to make sure that-"

Lance cut him and said, "Chillax, big guy, I got this." Hunk huffed and let his friend keep talking. "Hey, uh excuse me?"

The vendor was much taller than the two of them, but also slender. Their sky-blue body made their red eyes pop out even more. "Yes?" Their voice was deep.

"Do you happen to have any kelper leaves here?" Lance asked.

"Kelper leaves.... possibly." They were also slow to talk and move. But soon enough, the vendor had gotten out a small bag of leaves that have an orange outline and deep-green veins. "These are your leaves?"

"Yep, those are them!" Lance stared at them. But then he nudged Hunk and went, "...that's what they look like, right?"

"...pretty sure..." Hunk muttered. "We'll take them. How much?"

They had managed to bargain for about 400 GAC, 300 less than what the vendor asked. But Hunk sacrificed a sample of one of his many hand-made snacks as a part of the payment.

"I can't believe you make snacks and don't tell anyone about them."

"If I told you guys, you'd take them all! Besides, they're supposed to be mine!"

"Yeah, well now, I want some!"

"SEE, THIS IS WHY I DIDN'T TELL YOU."

Lance eyed the clock and scoffed. "We already wasted an entire varga looking for the stupid leaves, what else do we need?"

Hunk scarfed down the rest of his cookie and wiped his hands on his pants. His other hand scrolled through the list and he read off, "Something called, 'cattie varse'? I dunno, I think it's a liquid. And one more called, 'sol peanuts'."

"What do the peanuts look like?"

"Uh.... regular peanuts. Like the ones back on Earth."

"Alright, Lancey Lance will take care of those! You look for that cat stuff and we'll go meet up with Coran."

Before Hunk could protest, Lance had already sprinted into one of the markets. Hunk doubted the peanuts were in there, but he did spy a few feminine looking aliens standing in the doorway. Of course that was Lance's objective.

Hunk trudged on through the shopping mall and through every store he could, looking for the described vial of blue liquid, often associated with a cat head on the label. No luck came his way and 20 dobashes passed. Hunk was started to feel the despair of lack of cattie varse in his hands when he started drifting toward the food court. At least her he could drown his sorrows with well-made samples.

He looked up at the area, drenched in tables and the sweet scent of food wafting in the air. He wanted to just sit down and eat now without worrying about eating later. He passed two sample stations, complementing the foods as he tasted. He didn't want to insult their chefs when they really did need a little more parsley and a lot less salt.

All of the conversations in the room had been blurring together in one, big, noisy mess. Hunk had overheard someone yelling over the phone at their spouse, another person was gossipping about their 'friend'. Someone else had been talking before they spat out their drink and started complaining about that.

"Sorry, I just didn't expect this to taste so bad. Honestly, I don't know how they expect to stay in business with this backwater excuse for a drink."

Hunk cocked his head over at them. In their hand was a phone and the other a cup with a little bit of blue liquid in it. Hunk stared at it, wide-eyed.

"Bingo." He muttered. He ran over to the table and slid to a stop just in front of it, "Hi, sorry! Just wanted to ask where you got that drink?"

They stared at Hunk before putting their phone down and pointing behind him, "That new place, the Cattie Cult? I wouldn't go their again, this is way too sour to be good."

"Awesome, than- wait, sour?" Hunk was bothered by that description for the drink. He looked back at the description Coran had given him "That stuff is supposed to be sweet as sugar, why is it sour?"

There were only a few people standing in front of the Cattie Cult. It wasn't too popular, evidently. But on the shelf behind the front counter, hunk could spot blue bottles.

Within ticks, he'd booked it across the court and slid to a stop in front of the counter, cutting off people from ordering their drink. "Sorry, I know!" He said. "I'll only be a dobash! Listen, I need to buy a some of that cattie varse, are you guys selling it in bulk?"

The cashier had a red hat on, part of her uniform. "Uh, well, our biggest serving size is about 36 ounces, but you can order multiple-"

"No, I mean, those bottles!" He pointed to the shelf behind her. "Pure, unadulterated cattie varse. Are you guys selling that? I really need it!"

"I don't know myself. I can get my manager to help you, if that's alright?"

"Yes, please, thank you!" He called after her while she ran to the back to get her boss. Hunk leaned against the counter, his worries finally easing down. To his left, however, was a rather disturbed couple. "Sorry, I just... I got places to be... You guys come here often?"

Surprisingly enough, one of them actually replied. "To the Cult? No, not really. But they're the cheapest place to get a drink. What they make is really sour."

Again, people said this extremely sugary drink was somehow the worst thing to taste in this mall. "That doesn't make any sense. Cattie varse is sweet."

"I heard they add sour flavoring to it so they can balance out the sweetness." The other half of the couple mentioned. "I guess if it was too sweet, we'd be sick."

"If it's too much of anything, you're gonna be sick." Hunk uttered. Behind him, a door opened. He turned to see someone roughly the same height as the cashier walked in front of her to the front counter. His red and white suit had a 'manager' pin on it.

"Can I help you?" His coarse voice was not friendly.

"Yeah, hi. Are you guys selling pure cattie varse by the bottle?" Hunk asked, touching his fingers together.

"We don't sell cattie varse. Just our simple sweet and sour drinks. Also some salads, if that interests you."

Hunk shook his head. "But can you just sell me one of those bottles of cattie varse? I'll be quick, I won't tell anyone!"

He looked behind himself at the many bottles on the shelf labeled, 'cattie varse'. Then turned back to Hunk and said, "That's not cattie varse."

Hunk was dumbfounded. "Uh, yes it is, I can see the label from here."

"We cannot sell pure cattie varse at this establishment."

"Why not?"

"We have limited stock. Only portions of it go into our drinks to create the most sweet and sour beverages in this part of the galaxy." He leaned forward. "And so we cannot sell cattie varse."

Hunk leaned on the counter. "Well, I'll give you the sour part, you've certainly got that. But these drinks are NOT appealing to your customers."

"Are you blind to the line standing beside you?"

"They're only here 'cause you sell the cheapest drinks in the whole mall! And you know why your drinks are so cheap?" Hunk leaned in close. "Because You. Don't. Sell."

The manager stepped back, almost scared of Hunk's words. "How do you know this?"

"Dude, it's tainted on the place. You're so desperate to sell that your prices hardly make up for what you purchase to make the drinks."

The manager's eyes narrowed and he scoffed. "And what would you ever do about this?"

"The solution is right in front of you!" Hunk pointed at the bottles. "Stop adding sour to your drinks, just sell cattie varse! People like things that are sweet!"

"If it's too sweet, then they won't drink it! They'll get sick and sue us!"

"Then add a little bit of sour! It doesn't need to be one or the other!"

The manager locked eyes with Hunk, as if he had ascended to another reality. "You... you are right." He latched onto Hunk's arm and shook it rapidly. "Thank you, my friend!"

Hunk tried to get his new friend to stop ripping his arm out of its socket. "No problem, dude! But can I still get some cattie varse?!"

Hunk had managed to leave with two entire bottles and a crowd began flocking around the newly refined beverage mart. He'd spent all his GAC, but he had what he needed. Now he just needed to get back to Coran and Lance.

He didn't dare try to run to their meeting point, in fear of dropping the glass bottles that were kept safe in the layers of plastic and paper. But he did walk faster. So fast that he almost went blowing past a stand that had really cost his attention.

"I've got the latest model in engineering feat, the TX-30!" A tall Galran vendor shouted. His purple face was full of joy as he marveled at his massive prosthetic arm. "It's one of our strongest models, equipped with great enhancements to make your life all the easier."

Hunk stared at the arm and it only reminded him of Sendak. Although Hunk never got to see Sendak personally, just his frozen body in the cryopod was enough to spook him. He still couldn't figure out how Shiro had even fought him off. Then again, Shiro was a lot stronger than he looked.

"Not only is our TX built to crush you biggest foes down to size," the Galra punched a wooden dummy into splinters instantly, wood flying in all directions. It was miraculous that it didn't actually hit anything. "But it can play your FAVOURITE battle music for those moments you need the inspiration!" He tapped a button on his forearm and a heavy metal band began emanating from a speaker on his shoulder. "It's a personal favourite!"

A small crowd had gathered around him to marvel at his prosthetics. "And if you don't like the big gun show, no worries! We got plenty of normal sized arms and legs, cybernetic implants, whatever you need!" He pulled back a door on his booth to reveal the many models of arms and legs inside. "Order your first prosthetic with installation and get a discount on the second, 45% off! Only 7000 GAC!"

Someone from the crowd had stood up and began talking to him. He laughed and hit their back a few times, saying something to them that sounded encouraging. The customer smiled and was handed a flier.

"Hey, don't be afraid to ask for me personally! That's Glycor!" He called as they walked away. Glycor went back to his booth to begin prepping his next display. That's when Hunk swooped in.

"Hey there!" Hunk asked, a little nervous to be talking to a Galra that wasn't Keith or one of the Blades.

Glycor turned his head and smiled, "Hello! Can I help you?" His voice was full of energy and pompousness.

"I have a friend who recently got out of a pretty rough fight. His arm isn't really working anymore, it looks kinda like this one." Hunk pointed to one of the shelved models. "Anyways, he can't move it at all. I was wondering what your opinion is?"

Glycor stood up and looked at the model Hunk had pointed out. He messed with its wrist a little bit and its upper bicep. "These models are high-end, built to last for a long time. You hardly need to perform maintenance on them because they're mostly self-repairing. See, some of them are built with an energy compartment, which lets them self-repair. My guess is that either the energy compartment is leaking or the arm just needs to be replaced."

"Ohhhh. Alright, and, uh, how would I access the energy compartment?" Hunk asked.

"This plate right here, assuming this is the same model." He tapped the black plate on the inner forearm. It snapped open to reveal the tangled mess of wires and chips inside the arm. "This small cylinder right here is the fuel line. If that, or anything connected to it is broken, it needs replacement."

"Alright, cool! Thanks, man."

"Of course! And if it turns out your friend needs a new arm entirely, you can send him to the Galra Metal Union. They'd fix him right up." He handed hunk a small flier with coordinates on it. "Just in case."

"Thanks, really!" Hunk smiled at him. "You're a big help."

"Of course. Hope it goes well." Glycor went back to his booth and removed the current model he had to attach an even bigger one.

Hunk traced himself back to the clock just a few dobashes early of Lance and Coran. Lance was the second to show up. His hands were covered in gloves clutching a bag.

"What happened to you?" Hunk asked.

"Well, turns out the sol peanuts are quite literally from sol." Lance scoffed.

"What's sol?" Hunk prompted.

"It means, 'sun,' and I do mean they literally make these things from the sun. So hot I nearly burned my hands off."

"Paladins! I see you've retrieved your desired ingredients!" Coran came up to their bench, lugging two bags worth of groceries in his arms. "As you can tell, so have I! But there's an issue. One of you is going to have to pilot. My arms are too tired from carrying around all these items."

Lance and Hunk looked at each other. Lance tried to jump up from the bench, but Hunk grabbed him by the leg and yanked him back down. The two began rushing to the pod, leaving Coran behind at a steady pace.

"I WANNA FLY THE POD HOME!"

"NO WAY!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you actually did manage to read that whole chapter, good for you! Hope you enjoyed that lil' bit of fluff. Things are gonna be fluffy for a while because oooooooh believe me, chapter 4 kicks it up a notch. I've had the draft for chapter 4 written out and I just recently jumped onto writing it. Expect things!


	3. The Green Paladin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following Hunk's advice given from the friendly Galra vendor at the space mall, Pidge finds that the power cell in Shiro's arm is damaged, ridden with cracks and leaking refined Galran quintessence. Knowing there was nothing they could do at the moment, Pidge brushes aside the issue and leaves the others to help prep for the dinner feast. Once everything is ready, they realize they hadn't really invited anyone else. Leave it to Pidge to bring the party.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eggghghghh this chapter was gonna play out in so many different ways, but it went back to quite a fluffy stage immediately.  
> The story isn't gonna be like this for a while longer, so enjoy this fluff while I'm able to make it.  
> I don't think this chapter is unbearably fluffy? Sorry if it is. I just.... I'm one of those authors that takes a long time to set up plot points. Trust me, almost everything I've written, I've written for a reason.

Pidge knocked on the door before opening. She couldn't hear what he said clearly, but Shiro made a sound that sounded like an invitation. He was sitting on his bed, messing with his limp arm.

"Hey, good to see you moving!" Pidge cracked a smile.

"Well, most of me." He broke eye contact to stare at his metal palm. Those gray eyes of his looked sad.

Pidge nodded and walked up to him. She took his arm out of his grasp and held it up to eye level. His fingers moved freely, but with no resistance. "You really can't move this, at all?"

"I've tried." He shifted his shoulder around, the one part of his arm that wasn't metal. But the arm didn't respond. "Hunk said something about a circuit being fried? I'm not too sure."

The light on the ceiling reflected off of Pidge's glasses, her eyes hidden behind the glaze. She shook his hand up and down, expecting some sort of response. But after no such response came, she dropped his hand and yelled, "I'LL BE RIGHT BACK!" She flew through the door frame. 

Shiro's hand hit the bed with a thump. He sat there staring at the open door for a solid 10 seconds before picking his hand back up and messing with it. The fact that he couldn't move his limb bothered him greatly.

For only those 10 seconds did Shiro have a moment of peace. Pidge hit the door frame on her way back and stumbled back with a toolkit in her arms. Shiro looked worried. "Uh, Pidge, is that really necessary?"

She glared at him and shouted, "Absolutely!" Her retort made Shiro jump. "I wanna know EXACTLY how that thing works, and this is just the opportunity to tear it apart and find out!"

"I, uh.... I dunno, this is pretty durable."

"And I'm pretty stubborn." She dropped the toolkit on the bed next to him.

Within minutes, Pidge had pried the tiny screws out of Shiro's wrist, keeping them in a nice and neat pile next to the screwdriver she had to use to remove them. She pulled on the cover to his hand, wedging a screwdriver between the plate and the wrist, and no matter how hard she pulled, the plate would not come up.

It had gotten to a point where Pidge made Shiro hold down his hand while she used both of hers to try and pull the plate up. Each attempt ended in either Pidge falling over or taking Shiro down with her.

After Shiro unwillingly elbowed her in the chest for the sixth time, she huffed and yelled, "How the heck are you supposed to repair this junk if you can't even open it up?!" She sat back down with her arms crossed and a pout on her lips.

"It's not something we should worry about right now." Shiro pulled his hand away from her, scared that she'd take her bayard to it and then there wouldn't be a hand anymore. He changed the topic. "Did you guys contact the Blade of Marmora about those new cruisers?"

Pidge looked at him blankly before shaking her head and scrambling to her feet. "I will... go do that!" Shiro didn't have time to respond to her panic before she had made it down the hall and to the elevator.

She tapped her feet on the floor and kept fidgeting with her hands. The elevator dinged and the doors slid open slowly. Pidge wedged her body between the doors and ran for the main lobby up ahead.

She slid to a stop in front of the control panel, her legs bumping the edge of it. She frantically moved around system checks, positioning monitors and an Altean card game and began typing out a message.

"VTN:CL Transmission 27-02-55; 18:56:714

New type of cruiser located. Possesses heavy armor that could not be penetrated by regular weapons. EMP cannon possible. Beware when engaging."

She located the hidden radio wave they had created for the Coalition's use and sent the message. It would broadcast for the next 42 vargas.

She sighed and slumped over the control panel. It had been roughly 2 vargas since the boys left. She was almost more worried than she was getting hungry again.

"Maybe I'll just call and see how they're doing.." She tapped the monitor and found their pod was on course back to the Castle. She started a call.

The video image flashed on screen and showed Lance, with his arms bandaged, bashing Hunk's unmoving arms in the pilot's seat.

"-SHOTGUN LAST TIME, AT LEAST LET ME FLY!" Lance barked.

"Lance, your arms are burnt! You CAN'T fly." Hunk scoffed. 

Lance growled a bit and muttered, "If I can't fly, neither can you."

"Now you're just being salty." Hunk broke eye contact and turned his attention to the dashboard. A video image of Pidge was there, and she looked clueless. "Oh, Pidge! How's Shiro?'

Pidge was lost in his words, but only for a moment. "He's fine, but I can't figure out how to disassemble his arm to find out what's wrong. It's like it's melded together."

"You... you tried to rip his arm off, is that what I'm hearing?" Lance asked.

"No!" She paused. "I wanted to take it apart, figure out how it works!"

"It's an arm, Pidge. How do arms work?" Lance asked like it was an obvious answer.

Pidge sighed and looked in defeat. "Lance, in a biological sense, it shouldn't work at all. Other than the iron in your blood, there should be no natural internal mechanism that uses metal. Either Shiro is made of steel, which I wouldn't doubt at this point, or this is an insanely advanced prosthetic that goes beyond biological understanding."

Lance stared blankly at the screen. "You lost me."

"How does steel connect to nerve endings, Lance, tell me that." Pidge wanted to smack her head on the console.

"I don't know? Why don't you answer?" He crossed his arms, trying to hide his utter confusion.

Hunk sighed and gave up on his clueless friend. "Pidge, what is the issue exactly?"

Pidge stared at them, tired. "I can't pull the cover off his arm. So I can't repair it. I can't even figure out what's WRONG with it."

"You're just trying to get the cover off? There's a hatch to do that." Hunk commented.

Pidge sat up straight, slamming her hands onto the dashboard. "What?! Where? Wait, no, don't tell me yet!" Her hands moved fast on the keyboard and she transferred the video feed to the screens in the dorms and bolted out of the lobby.

Shiro's screen flashed on and Hunk and Lance's faces were visible on the wall. He looked up and stared at it, not knowing the Castle was capable of such communications. "That's... new..." He muttered.

"Hey, Shiro, you awake?!" Lance yelled.

"Where are you guys?"

"Oh, we went shopping! You seriously ought to go to that mall. Really nice." Lance leaned on the dashboard of the pod, but hissed and pulled his arm up when his burns reacted to contact.

"Shiro, I met this guy with Galra Tech prosthetics and he explained to me how we could fix yours!"

"Oh. That's...." Shiro was hesitant to reply right away. "Useful..."

"You okay?" Lance had a little worry in his tone. "Hunk talked to the guy himself, said he didn't seem too bad."

"Yeah, I don't think he was gonna be out to kill anyone. Seriously, one of the nicest Galra I have ever met, next to Keith."

"No, I'm sure he's fine. I just don't -" The doors slammed open and a panting Pidge stomped in the room. Her hair was ruffled and glasses crooked. She grabbed Shiro's arm and barked, "OKAY, TELL ME WHAT TO DO."

Her ragged breathing and abrupt actions left the boys uneasy. But Hunk let go of the feeling and started explaining.

"Okay, there should be a black panel on the forearm, closer to the elbow."

Pidge twisted the arm over and noticed the panel. Shiro winced a bit, his shoulder being pulled in the wrong direction. "I see the panel."

"If you push down on it, it'll pop back up."

She did so and the panel popped up, revealing an endless array of wires. "That... actually worked."

"Okay, the guy I was talking to said that his arm is self-repairing because it has a power cell in it. If it's cracked, it won't work, so is there, like, a cylinder or something in his arm?"

Pidge held it up closer. There was a cylinder-shaped... thing attached to the inside of his arm. Not only was there a long crack in the side of it, but something bright purple was dripping out.

She cringed. "Ahh geez, there's like blood in here or something!"

"Last I checked, metal arms don't need blood." Lance muttered, mocking Pidge.

"Could it be oil to loosen up the joints or...?" Shiro sounded worried.

"Last  _I_ checked, oil isn't purple and glowing." She was talking more to Lance than she was to Shiro.

"Wait, did you say purple?!" Coran yelled from the back of the speeder, his arms clutching the bags of groceries. "Purple AND glowing?!"

"Y-yes." Pidge muttered. "Do you want me to get a sample..?"

"Yes, please do!"

Pidge took a small sample plate and scraped the liquid onto the piece of glass. It didn't roll right off like water would, but it wasn't exactly sticky either. She took the sample down to her lion's hangar and began running it under a microscope and testing it for its chemical components.

"Yeah, uh, whatever this is, it's not coming through as elements or chemicals. It's just got a really high rate of energy output." Pidge closed examined it. "Probably why it glows."

"You mean its got a lot of energy compared to other substances?" Hunk commented. "That's probably the stuff that powers his arm."

"Run it through the Altean scanners instead of your Earth machine." Coran chided.

Pidge wanted to say there was nothing wrong with her computer, but heeded and placed the sample underneath an Altean scanner. It took a few seconds to come up with a definition for the substance. Pidge adjusted her glasses and read closely.

"It says it's... quintessence. This is the stuff that powers Voltron." She looked back at the purple liquid. "Shiro, you have quintessence in your arm."

"Lotor wasn't kidding when they said they use quintessence for EVERYTHING." Hunk muttered.

"And again, are we really sure that we should be helping that grape get more of this stuff?" Lance was bitter.

"If it means peace for the Galra, then what else could we possibly do?" It almost seemed like Shiro was scolding the red paladin.

Lance sighed and didn't say anything. He averted his eyes from the video.

Pidge couldn't help but feel that Lance wanted to say something more. Shiro trusted Lotor and said it was his decision to support Lotor's cause. Pidge had never spoken out against Shiro before and was almost thankful that Lance was the one doing it. She didn't want to get yelled at by Shiro, of all people.

"Pidge?" Shiro's voice came over the comms.

"What?"

"My arm is... still in pieces."

Pidge took a moment to process the information, then pressed her hand into her face. "Sorry...."

"No, you're fine. I just thought that- Pidge, are you okay?"

Pidge had let her head rest on the table, being hit with exhaustion out of nowhere. "I'm tired..." 

"Then... don't worry about it. Go get some sleep." Shiro resolved. 

"No, it's fine.... I'll be right there." 

The green paladin lazily walked to the elevator and barely lifted her hand to press the buttons. She was slumped against the wall of the elevator and her eyes fluttered trying to stay awake. By the time she reached Shiro's room, she had nearly fallen over walking.

"Pidge, if you really need sleep, I think I can figure out how to do this."

"No..." She slapped his arm by accident trying to grab the screwdriver. "You'll just... break something."

It took a long time, but Pidge was able to push all the wires back into place and all the screws into their proper slots. "We'll... replace the power cell.... when we get power..."

She picked up her tool kit and began walking out of the room. Shiro sat back on his bed, his eyes lazy. He messed with the tips of his metal hand. But the thud of Pidge's body made him jolt up. She'd collapsed and was snoring with one hand still clutching the toolkit.

~~~

Pidge rolled around in her bed a few times. It was completely quiet in her dorm. No one disturbed her and she was content in her sleep. But she still felt a strong urge to get up anyways.

She sat upright and rubbed her eyes with her hands, brushing her fluffy hair out of her face. She sat there for a few minutes, just enjoying being awake before getting up. Her glasses and the toolkit were neatly place on the table across from her bed. She wanted to ask who put them there, as she had no memory of doing it herself.

She left the room and went back to the elevator that she had already visited maybe six times today. She sent it to the kitchen floor, surprised by the business in the room.

Hunk was stood in front of the oven with an apron around his neck. He was checking on something in the oven. Lance was busy with some blue liquid in a tall bottle. He was pouring it into a proper pitcher filled with ice. Allura and Coran were setting a table with proper utensils and plates. And who other than the person missing an arm to be trying to help Hunk finish cooking?

"Shiro, you gotta hold your hand reeeeally steady when you're trying to cut the berries. They move easily." Hunk had only taken a glance to give Shiro the instruction.

"Sorry, I'm... not great at this." He muttered to himself. He looked frustrated with what looked to be a strawberry and cut it into uneven pieces. He'd put on a long-sleeve to cover up his limp arm, but it had stained the left-sleeve badly while cutting the fruit. It was interesting to watch him use only one hand to do the work.

"If you want, you can let me do it. It's easier with two hands." Hunk offered, holding up both his palms.

"No, I want to help. It's not fair that you treat me and I don't do anything to help." He proved his point by then cutting another berry into slightly less uneven pieces.

No one had noticed Pidge was stood in the doorway until Lance looked up from his drink dispensing and called her out. "What are you doing just standing there? If you're awake, you should help."

"Ignore him." Hunk muttered. "If you wanna help, you can. But you seemed pretty tired, I thought we'd just let you sleep."

"No, I'm fine. Just that nap was all I needed." She sat on a stool at the counter and asked, "What can I help with?"

"Not a lot, since everything takes forever to cook."

Pidge looked over at Shiro again. His metal arm was limp at his side, swaying with every motion. He was starting to cut the berries faster, but he still had a lot of fruit left.

"Give me a knife, I'll help." Pidge held out her hand, expecting a blade from Hunk.

"You, of all people, I don't trust with a knife."

"Would you prefer I use my bayard? 'Cause I can do that."

Shiro looked up at that comment, worried.

Hunk sighed and took a knife from the drawer, handing it to Pidge by the handle. She took some of the berries off the pile and began cutting them into small pieces and dumping them into the bowl Shiro had already started. Pidge didn't want to admit it but she was drowsy from her nap. She didn't move nearly as fast as Shiro did.

She watched him use a single hand to move the fruit from the bowl to the board then cut it almost perfectly in half in a parallel and perpendicular pattern before pushing it over into the other bowl.

"How are you so good at this?" She commented, taking her time to cut her pieces. "Actually, a better question: what is it that you're not good at?"

Shiro looked up and a smile cracked on his face. "I am not good at this, at all. You should've seen me earlier."

"Slanderous lies. You're good at a LOT of things, Shiro." Hunk mentioned. "One of the best pilots I've ever seen. Better than Keith, I'd say."

"I'm really not." He almost seemed embarrassed. "If piloting the Red Lion took so much skill, then it's obvious that Keith is better than me." He continued to cut. 

Lance narrowed his eyes and leaned on the counter. "Well, I pilot the Red Lion now... would you say I'm skilled?"

Pidge scoffed. "You're a procrastinator, Lance. We went over this in the middle of a firefight today."

Lance groaned and crossed his arms. "What's a procrastinator?" Allura asked, her utensils chiming together as she set them out.

"It's like when you put off something important till the last second or just don't do it at all." Hunk explained. "Lance is super guilty of that."

"Oh! Yes, I believe that was something on Altea. We didn't call it that, we just said they were a kortle."

"A kortle, what's that?" Pidge asked.

"A very slow moving creature... and ignorant one, at that." Coran said. "If you pushed them to do anything, they would do anything but."

"Sounds like Lance." Shiro snickered.

"I am not like that anymore!" Lance yelled.

"So you admit that you put off homework till the last second?" Hunk asked, pointing his knife towards Lance.

"So what if I did, Iverson didn't deserve my full attention."

"Oh, so you're pinning the blame on Iverson? What did he do to you?" Shiro asked.

"Scolded me in front of the class every day. And it's not like he was much help in 'bonding' activities. Sometimes I wanna just clock him in the face."

Pidge looked away from her fruit. "Lance, do you even know what happened to Iverson and his one eye?" She looked at Lance like she knew something devious.

"...what happened." Lance asked, leaning closer to his friend.

"A certain cadet punched him in the face." She looked back at her fruit, smiling as she cut a berry in half. "So hard and so unexpectedly, Iverson lost feeling in his left eyelid and he couldn't open it anymore."

Lance was silent, but his expression gave away his internal monologue. He took in a deep breath and muttered, "Keith did that, didn't he."

"Now that I think about it... yeah, he did." Hunk muttered. He started snickering. "Hah, Keith punched Iverson in the face."

"Keith.... Keith punched Iverson?" Shiro asked. "Why would he do that?"

Everyone fell silent. Shiro seemed shocked by the idea. The others were scared to tell him that Keith was probably the exact kind of person to do that.

Pidge spoke first. "He was probably just really upset. Y'know with you disappearing and Iverson... well, scolding him."

Hunk was next. "Yeah, I didn't really know Keith at all in the Garrison. But if you had just disappeared overnight and I was that impulsive, I probably could've punched someone, too."

Shiro blanked out and didn't say anything else. He seemed lost by the idea that Keith had decked Iverson. Coran had finished setting the table and had sat down next to Pidge. "I know you humans are enjoying your little conversations, but perhaps we can discuss guest services now?"

Pidge snapped her fingers. "Oh yeah, we didn't invite anyone else, did we?"

Hunk set down the tray on the counter and said, "We're not gonna be done for another 4 vargas. The stuff takes forever."

"I'll get my brother then." She smiled.

"Oh sweet! Now I can ask Matt how he beat that stupid level of Killbot..." Lance pumped his fist in pre-certain victory.

Pidge ran out of the room, leaving her knife and remaining fruit on the counter. She bolted into the command room and began a message to Matt.

"Hey, we're having a small party later, if you wanna come by! It's more like a family-dinner. Everyone wants to see you again!"

She sent the message to her brother, eagerly awaiting his reply. He often replied fast, like a quick-message line. Most of their conversations were in real-time. But she didn't know what he would be doing by now. Maybe in a fight, maybe just cruising. She hoped for the cruising.

Still, Pidge felt she was forgetting something. She wanted to invite her whole family to the party, but everyone knew they shouldn't go back to Earth incase the rogue Galra attempted to attack. Sending just her father back was a risk on its own. And knowing it, her mother was still worried sick.

She realized who she was forgetting. Although her relative family was still very separated, there was one other person who she would consider family. She started writing:

"Not sure how busy you are, but if you're able to come by, you should. Everyone misses you. We're have a dinner party, if that's any more incentive, lots of good stuff!"

She attached the castle's current coordinates to the message and sent it. Just as she clicked send, her phone started buzzing and she checked the messages. Matt had replied:

"Sounds great! Send location, tho. Cant find u by guessing."

Pidge sent their coordinates to Matt as well and hugged her phone. It felt nice to know her family was starting to come together again. She stood up and went back down to the kitchen to find everyone gone aside from Hunk, who was just washing one of the knives.

"Everyone went to get some sleep. It's been a long day for them, too." Hunk explained.

"Yeah, I guess it has." Pidge muttered. "We only left at like 6 this morning, right? Then we got shot down at noon, started dinner at 4... Geez, day went by."

"You act like this is normal."

"Isn't it, by now?" Pidge sighed and put her head on the cold counter.

"I guess." He tucked the knife away in a drawer and yawned. "I'm getting some sleep. Dinner should be ready in 3 vargas."

"M'kay." Pidge moaned. She listened to Hunk's receding steps until it had grown silent in the kitchen. The table looked beautifully set and the drinks were properly stowed away in the refrigerator. Lance had tried his best to make them look beautiful by adding small, make-shift umbrellas to each cup. A few umbrellas had broken off and fell into the drink itself, but at least he tried.

Pidge trudged back down to the Green Lion's hangar. It was quiet, aside from the tapping of her shoes on the floor.

The Green Lion's particle barrier dropped as she approached, its eyes beginning to burn a bright yellow. It growled lowly, enough that Pidge could hear the echo in the chamber. Her lion bent down and opened its jaw to the floor.

Pidge smiled up at her lion and muttered, "You're always so cute when you do that." She ascended its ramp into the cockpit and sat down in the pilot's seat. The lights of the interior tainted Pidge a lime-green. She clutched the stick shifts of her lion and said, "You wanna go for a little fun-ride?"

The Lion stood up on its legs and began to drift down the runway to the exterior of the ship. It hovered into the open-space, free of all gravity, limp in the air.

Pidge sighed and said, "I know I said that I like being surrounded by tech, but it's nice to just... be somewhere empty." The Castle slowly drifted away from them, but the Green Lion would have no issues with catching up if the Castle did get too far ahead. She looked out at all the stars blinking in the sky, trying to imagine which one might've been her galaxy. She counted at least 15 stars that looked like galaxy clusters before losing track in the array of lights.

"So many different stars and planets and realities... and we've only seen a small percentile of them." Her mind drifted back to the trans-reality comet they'd discovered. It was lodged in an Altean ship that had managed to drift between realities. It almost hurt to think about the endless other realities that might exist and how many stars and planets existed there, as well. She almost drifted into the endless void portion, but dragged herself away out of fear of existentialism.

Instead, she could only think of Sven. Pidge wasn't so sure who he was, but his appearance had set all of them on edge. Shiro had been missing for nearly a month when they had first met Sven, who was physically identical. His hair looked different and the weird accent he had wasn't something Shiro could imitate. But just his existence was enough to conjure endless questions.

She almost wanted to see Sven again. Not just because he was interesting, but the last time they'd seen Sven, he was being rushed to some urgent care after taking a bullet for Lance. What did Sven call it?? A space hospital??? No one really believed those existed, but then again, a space mall sounds even less likely.

Did they even tell anyone about this alternate reality? Coran had heard the basics of it, but they never went into detail, did they? Shiro probably didn't know he had a Scandinavian twin in another reality. And if he did know, then they'd have even more questions. For some odd reason, Pidge couldn't help but think that Shiro would've loved to meet Sven. Maybe they could've been good friends, if only they could find a way back into that other reality.

Something beeped on the dashboard. Pidge sat up and squinted her eyes at the monitor. A transmission was incoming for her specifically.

She opened the line and said, "H-Hello?" She almost sounded like a cat meowing.

"Is that the Green Lion I see?" Matt's voice rang over the phone.

"You're here already?!" Pidge yelled. "Geez, you're fast!"

"Well, it's more or less right on the dime. I'm about to run out of fuel, heheh."

Pidge glared at the blank monitor. "You shouldn't have come out here if you were gonna risk stranding yourself."

"How do I resist a party invite where there's CATTIE VARSE?! That stuff is the sweetest drink eh-ver."

"I know we were fighting the biggest and scariest empire that rules the universe, but sometimes I'd think you're going to get yourself killed before the Galra had the chance."

"You're not much better,  _paladin._ Your castle is drifting away without you."

"Hey, I'll have you know I came out here intentionally!"

"Suure you did." Matt snickered.

Pidge guided Matt's shuttle into the Green Lion's hangar and they shared the platform. She slid down the ramp and landed on the floor smoothly, greeting her brother at the mouth of her lion. He hadn't taken off his rebel fighter suit, but he'd managed to brush his lengthy hair.

"You should cut your hair eventually." Pidge muttered, looking at the split-ends on his strands.

"Who's to say this isn't some new, awesome look back on Earth?" He shrugged.

"I am. I was there 5 months ago."

"Things can change in 5 months!"

"I don't think Earth fashion would shift to something like this unless there was a nuclear fallout." Pidge snickered. Matt glared at his sister and muttered something under his breath.

Pidge took her brother to the elevator and up to the kitchen floor, hoping someone else would be in the dining room to greet him. But it was only the Holts.

"Low-maintenance party?" Matt asked.

"Everyone's probably still sleeping. We had a rough time today." She sat down at a stool near the counter and her brother joined her.

"I heard. Over the radio... A tank cruiser...?" He looked past Pidge like he was imagining the new battleship in the hallway. "We have a hard enough time with regular cruisers. And if the lions can't take them down..."

"We didn't even get a chance to counter-attack. It just one-shotted us." Pidge huffed. "Felt really unfair."

"One-shotted? What the heck did it do?"

"An EMP blast that disabled all of Voltron. And knocked out Shiro."

Matt's fingers grasped the edge of the counter and his eyes lit up with fear. "Is he okay!?"

"What? Oh, yeah, he's fine now! He's okay." Matt eased up a little bit. "Still... it was weird. Didn't sleep the rest of us."

"Maybe 'cause he's the head... he took... all the damage off you guys???"

"That's what I thought, too. But... I don't know. Just a few minutes later, the Black Lion came back online, but the Green Lion didn't."

"I dunno then. Can't help ya there."

"Oh well... Hey, what have you guys been doing?"

Matt smiled and put a hand on his chest. "Well,  _I_ discovered a secret Galran prison that was holding top-wanted fugitives of the empire. We think one of the previous commanders is still holding it hostage. We're planning to raid it sometime in the next few days."

"Who's being held there?"

"That's the thing. We went through the data records of nearby stations and according to those, this prison doesn't even exist. It's hidden from average Galra intelligence. Super secret."

"So... whoever they got their is someone super threatening to the Empire. That's definitely something to worry about. How'd you find it?"

"I'd like to brag and say I interrogated an officer till he cried his secrets out, but... uh... I actually just flew over it."

"There's no way-"

"Oh, yes there is! My trade route was right there, going over the facility. I thought it was just some unmarked, new colony, but when I got closer, I recognized the emblems on the ships docked there."

"They would've shot you down!"

"They would've tried." He winked at his sister.

Pidge laughed and put her face on the cold counter. She said through her laughing, "I can't believe you."

Someone had come walking down the hall, but Pidge didn't tell her brother. In fact, she was hoping someone would come along and say a hello.

"Hey, Pidge, you in here?" Lance hung his head around the doorframe. "Is your brother-"

He stopped mid-sentence when he noticed two Pidge's sitting in the room. It was easier to tell them apart when Pidge had her helmet on. "Oh, hey, Lance!" The shorter Pidge piped.

"Hey." Matt waved. "Good to see you-"

Lance wasted no time and wrapped his hands around Matt's arm. "YOU'RE COMING WITH ME, RIGHT NOW."

"WAIT, WHERE, WHY, WHAT'S GOING-" Matt was sped out of the kitchen and down the hall. "LAAAANCE, WHERE ARE YOU TAKING ME!"

"TO KILLBOT PHANTASM I, YOU'RE TEACHING ME HOW TO BEAT LEVEL 35."

Their voices trailed and eventually ceased when Lance had successfully pinned Matt into the elevator and were on their way to Killbot.

Pidge paid no attention, taking her time to enjoy the silence. It was nice having her brother around again, someone actually related to her. She'd, of course, come to know Lance and the others to be a family of sorts. But she'd only known them for about a year versus her brother who she's known her whole life. She connected with him much easier than she did the other paladins.

When in the Garrison, Pidge never really talked to Lance or Hunk or any other cadet personally. She still didn't want to even after they had met Keith and Shiro. And that was the weird part: Shiro was the only one she'd really managed to open up to. He was the only who really understood what she was going through and had accepted what she wanted to do.

And up until Shiro's disappearance, Pidge still only trusted Shiro with how she felt. He was the only one who knew she'd kept up her search for Matt. He understood what it meant to lose someone you cared about. She never told Allura or any of the others about her hopes.

Pidge sighed and crossed her arms onto the countertop. She wanted to tell the others, especially Keith, about what she had been planning. But she still feared their neglect for her idea. Everyone had grown cold to the idea of individuals mattering more than the crowd. Often times their missions to rescue specific people ended with bitter feelings, or worse complications. When they tried to rescue Lubos of the Olkari and found he'd only turned traitor to his people. Trying to save Shay and her people on the Balmera and luring a Robeast to the poor planet, nearly killing everyone there. Worst of all was Allura being captured by Zarkon and nearly losing the Black Lion.

She didn't want to think about it. Shiro had to have a better bond with the Black Lion by now. The Wing-Blades were a symbol of their connection, a weapon the Black Lion would unveil only if it truly trusted Shiro. That paired with its other-worldly ability to teleport and allowing Shiro to retrieve his bayard, it's hardly in question with how connected the two were by now.

But... did Shiro really have that strong bond anymore? After he disappeared from the Black Lion's cockpit, Keith was put up as next paladin. Had it so quickly forgotten about its previous paladin for a reason? At the time, Zarkon was still alive. If anything, it should've favored Zarkon if Shiro had disappeared.

Yet as soon as Keith sat down in the pilot's seat, the Black Lion had accepted him. It seemed to have that trend. When they first opened the doors to the Black Lion's hangar, the lion itself wasn't hidden behind a particle barrier. It openly welcomed Shiro to be its pilot, roaring in unison with its fellow lions. Perhaps the Black Lion was significantly more trusting than the other lions. It would explain why it was so hard to break Zarkon away from it.

But it doesn't explain why it let go of Shiro so easily. Shiro said he'd practically begged the Black Lion to trust him until he'd asked Keith to take over for that mission. Why was it so on-and-off?

"Pidge, why are you in here?" Pidge snapped up to Allura's question. Her blue-ish eyes looked worried. "It's awfully early for dinner."

"I'm... I'm just resting."

"In the kitchen..?" Allura raised an eyebrow.

"Well, what are YOU doing in here?"

"W-well I... For your information, Hunk ASKED me to come and check on something he was making." She spun on her heel to the oven. She opened the oven and a wave of heat hit her in the face, blowing her white hair back.

"It's very hot... Which is good. He wanted it hot." Allura muttered. "But is it... too hot?"

"You don't know what he asked, do you?"

Allura snapped up straight and scoffed. "You wouldn't know either!"

"I might. I was in a crew with him for 9 months. If not for him, I'd probably still be eating microwave ramen packets." Pidge smiled smugly to herself and adjusted her glasses as if remembering a fond memory. "What's in the oven?"

Allura pulled the door open wider for Pidge to see from her spot at the counter. "It looks like a pan with... some kind of white.... texture."

"Oh, that's just bread. Y'know the same kinda stuff he used to make the cinnamon rolls."

Allura stared at the tray. Her brows furrowed and she asked, "There are two kinds of bread...?"

"Allura, there's so many types of bread I can't even name them."

"Why don't you just call them by their names then, rather than just bread?"

"'Cause they're all bread?"

"That doesn't make any sense if they're all different."

"They're not so different that it's gonna kill you if you have the wrong type, it's just... well, some have different flavors and textures. Some work better in certain recipes than others would."

Allura stared blankly at her fellow paladin. The concept of categorizing unfamiliar objects made no sense to the princess.

Pidge sighed and said, "You know how people look at a strawberry and a blueberry. They're just berries, even though they're two different KINDS of berries."

"Why do you call them strawberries?" Allura asked.

Pidge was thinking of a response before reality slapped her in the face: she really didn't know  _why_  people called them strawberries. They didn't look like straws, and you didn't use straws to eat them. "I... really don't know. You'd have to ask someone else."

"Who, like Hunk?"

"I doubt Hunk would know."

"We wouldn't know unless we asked." Allura chided. She shut the oven door and leaned onto the counter. "So, tell me. Why are you REALLY in here?" She smiled that same smile that signaled her need to talk to someone other than the mice.

"Well, I invited my brother over and he just got here before Lance dragged him off somewhere else."

"Yes, I saw. Tell me, what is it that's so entertaining about that system you two bought?"

Pidge huffed. "Do you want the quick version or the extended version?"

Allura looked towards the counter, as if she was pondering the choices. "Whichever you want." She responded whole-heartedly.

"Okay, bear with me. I'm about to nerd out here and you may not get it."

For the next varga, Pidge and Allura had gotten into an intense conversation about Killbot Phantasm I. Pidge not only explained the deeply emotional plot behind the main character and his connection to the Killbots and his allies, but the underlying combat difficulties. The game was infamous back on Earth for being impossible to play without the power-glove giving infinite lives. Only a few thousand people managed to beat it without the power glove, but many never came forward. 36 whole levels of trying to figure out what Phantasm's connection was to the murderous bots that pursued him and his friends, and you only were given 9 lives to do it. Sure, there were save points. But once you lost a life, it was gone for good. If you had one life at level 9, you'd have one life until you beat the game or you quit trying. And they hadn't even begun talking about platforming.

"Well, I don't see the issue. You have one life the entire game but you can save your progress? Just figure out how to beat the level without dying by going through it over and over again."

"It's not about figuring out the levels, it's about getting to the end of it. The game has tons of easy ways to die and lose your lives, and you NEED to have at least 2 lives by the final level in order to beat it! It even warns you about it when you get down to your last 2 lives. You risk beating the game or losing your progress."

"I guess that would be... very irritating."

There was rustling in the hallway, followed by rapidly approaching footsteps. The two girls hadn't noticed until Hunk came sliding around the corner shouting, "WHY DIDN'T THE TIMER GO OFF?!"

They were awe struck by his sudden appearance. "Timer? What timer?" Allura asked.

"THE ONE YOUR ARM IS ON!" Hunk pointed towards her forearm pressed against the counter. Allura lifted her arm off the surface and found a flat-screened ticker on the counter. It had been paused.

Allura gasped and nearly dropped the ticker on the floor. "I'm sorry! I had no idea-"

"Just get away from the oven!" Hunk yelled. Allura dodged behind the counter and Hunk ripped the pan out of the oven, revealing the scorched bread rolls. He sighed, threw the pan onto the counter and hid his head in shame.

"I'm... I'm really sorry, Hunk. I should've been paying more attention." Allura put a hand on his arm. "I... hope we can recover the bread."

"No, it's not gonna be edible after being burnt to a crisp.... They weren't too important. Just some snack pieces I'd made in case someone wasn't too hungry."

"I like those..." Pidge muttered.

"Well, uh... is there... anything we can do to help you now?" Allura smiled and held her hands together in a polite fashion.

He looked at her kind face and smiled himself. "Yeah. The bread is gone, which means everything is more or less ready."

The three began setting out the prepared delicacies, many of Earth's variety and others prepared by Alteans. Cattie varse lined every glass on the table, accompanied by a small umbrella in the top of the cup. Allura had taken a small handful of sol peanuts from a heat-safe jar and bit down with delight, enjoying the spicy flavor. But Pidge denied the snack, saying she didn't like peanuts... or the burning sun.

"Okay, we have one, two... seven coming tonight, right?" Allura asked.

"Maybe eight." Pidge mentioned.

"Eight?" Hunk asked. "Who's the eighth?"

"I invited Keith. I figured he might wanna come by again, have some time away from the Blades." 

Allura and Hunk looked almost shocked by Pidge's proposal but then nodded. "Yeah, he probably needs it."

"I still didn't get a response from him. I don't know if he even got my message." Pidge clutched her phone in her hands, hoping it would ding with a message from the former Red Paladin.

"We can't get our hopes up. Remember, now that he's working with the blades, he's going to be on missions more than he'll be able to rest for." Allura commented. "It's hard-work, what he's doing."

No one could argue with that. Working with the Blades and as the leader of Voltron was taking a toll on Keith. No one was entirely sure why he wanted to work with them, Pidge guessed to pursue his Galra roots, but there was no distinct reward he would receive for his actions. It only distanced him from the other paladins and in the end, cut him off entirely. His absence pushed Shiro back into a leadership position, the very one Keith had neglected since the beginning. And even before that, he wasn't showing signs of composition in his choices.

He'd nearly thrown the entire team into discourse chasing down Lotor. He wasn't able to make the proper decision: to fight Lotor head-on or to chase down the Galra cargo ship. Pidge felt awful for Keith. He was a passive leader, never upfront. All he wanted to do was follow and be content with such.

Pidge didn't want to bring it up, but she didn't think Shiro was leading Keith in the right direction. Shiro may have had confidence in Keith's ability as a leader, but almost any time Keith faltered, he had to take over and only seemed to scold Keith afterwards. She didn't ask 'cause she didn't know their history. Shiro used to be Keith's mentor in the Galaxy Garrison. Maybe this was just a specific way that he taught.

"Pidge..." Hunk shook her shoulder. "Hey, Yellow to Green, you there, buddy?"

Pidge snapped up. "What, what's wrong?" She clutched her phone tighter. Allura and Hunk were staring at her.

"Your phone, it's doing something." He pointed at the screen in her palms. "I dunno, did you set an alarm or?"

Pidge released her grip just enough that she felt the phone buzzing on her fingers. She frantically slid it open and held it up to her ear.

"Hello?" She asked."

"Hey, uh, it's Keith. Sorry I never replied, but I just realized that I can't get into the castle, can you open one of the hangars?"

~~~

He had safely landed his craft in the hangar next to the Green Lion, the alleged new docking bay. Pidge, Lance and Matt were at the entrance to the hangar, watching as he stepped out of his craft. He'd gone back to wearing his regular jeans and red jacket instead of his Blade uniform. It felt nostalgic to see him like that.

Before he'd even gotten the chance to safely tuck his knife into his belt, Pidge had already leaped onto his shoulders shouting, "We missed you!!"

Keith stumbled backwards at Pidge's sudden weight and almost fell to the ground. "PIDGE!" He yelled. He eventually did topple with Pidge on top of him. She was small but surprisingly heavy. He laughed as they fell, but almost regretted the laughter as one of her elbows got lodged into Keith's ribcage.

"AHGH." He cried out and winced, trying not to open his eyes, pouting the whole time.

"Sorry!" She rolled off him and onto the cold metal floor. "We're just... you're...." She sighed. "I'm happy your home."

It was like all the pain in his body disappeared at her last word. He smiled weakly and said, "Feels welcoming."

"Oh, don't cry here. You'd be in real tears if you saw everything we've made." Lance crossed his arms with a smirk.

" _You're_ the one who was crying over cinnamon rolls, Lance." Pidge commented.

"You were crying over cinnamon rolls?" Keith reiterated. "Who are you and where'd you hide Lance?"

"Very funny, mullet." Lance glared at his rival. Keith stood up straight, rubbing the back of his neck.

"You still don't like my hair." He didn't seem bothered by Lance's insult in the slightest.

Lance eyed Keith, crossing his arms. "Okay, what's with you, why are you so happy?"

Keith was taken aback . "Am I acting strange?" He sounded worried.

"You're usually more broody and emo than this." Pidge muttered.

Keith had no idea what that meant, keeping a steady stare on Pidge. "I'm... 'emo'? What is that?"

She actually expected him to know. "Well, you're.... I mean, it's when...." Pidge was trying to come up with a good definition. "It's like, you're all edgy and you wear dark colors and you like stuff that's violent and.... stupid stuff like that."

"Since when have I liked being violent?" Keith looked to Matt and Lance for an answer. Pidge, for the second time that day, wanted to slam her head into a wall. Lance was an idiot, but Keith was dense. She would have to explain a joke to him because the punchline didn't register.

She didn't try to explain further, no matter how much Keith prompted her to. He seemed upset that he didn't get an answer, but he didn't snap like she thought. Whenever Keith didn't get his way, he'd complain or yell or do something angsty. But no hint of such impulsiveness was present. She didn't want to bring it up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And another chapter down. Chapter 4, OH BOY. It is gonna change some stuff. Really, I'm probably gonna throw y'all for a fuckin' loop. It's gonna get confusing, but I don't think I've ever ended any pieces of my writing on serious cliffhangers, at least, not without posting the next chapter IMMEDIATELY. I love my complete stories, but I leave cliffhangers for the cheap tension, like anyone else would. The next chapter, you should be able to figure out what's going on. And if you don't, I gave a huge giveaway in the last few sentences. Chapter 4 should be up in.... a week? Less? More? I always reblog a post on my Tumblr when I've posted a new chapter, so mark that as an indicator.   
> This is the second to last chapter that I've had prewritten, so don't worry if I suddenly have a hiatus again. It just means I'm taking some time aside to write another chapter so I don't end up with half-assed chapters.


	4. ---TRANSMISSION CUT--- Dead Space ---TRANSMISSION CUT---

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> :))))))))))))))))

Without a lion or any kind of castle ship to provide a heat source, space is freezing. Even with an airtight suit of paladin armour, you won't find a heat source easily. Shiro felt that freeze on his entire body. Even his unfeelable metal hand was sapped of all heat. The cold pressed into his body where steel met flesh.

It was all he could feel around him. His own weight had disappeared, like he was floating in zero-gravity. But he didn't want to open his eyes. Not yet. Just let me rest for a few more seconds.

It was eerily quiet. Even his own breathing seemed to disappear into the empty void. He thought there was a small ringing, somewhere. But it was only in his head. That ringing that would only appear when it was too quiet.

Shiro forced his gray eyes open, staring into the void of space. Billions of stars gleamed through its darkness, but none of them were relatively close. They flickered, a sign that they were billions of lightyears away.

He moaned, the pounding headache catching up with him. It's what forced him awake. He wanted to take off his helmet and lay down somewhere, where he could feel the pull of gravity, knowing it would keep him tied to wherever he would stay.

Shiro almost pulled the helmet off his head. He nearly exposed his body to the vacuum of space. But with tired eyes, he lifted his hands away and hugged himself, trying to get any warmth he had left in his body to come out. It felt like he was trapped in an icicle. He hadn't been this freezing since he was imprisoned on the cold, Galran prison ship. His only warmth came from the adrenaline rush of fighting in the arena.

He cringed at himself and shut his eyes, trying to push away the memory. But the headache only seemed to drag it further in front of his eyes. He moaned again and curled up enough that he could hug his armour-covered legs. He was desperate for warmth.

After just a few seconds of hugging, he let go of his legs. He opened his eyes again and sighed, trying to convince himself that working will make him warm.

"Princess, are you there?" Shiro spoke in a croaked voice, like he was parched. He didn't realize how much this throat was hurting, but tried to ignore the pain. "Princess?"

No reply came over the radio. His heart beat just a little faster. "Hello? Princess? Coran? Can anyone hear me? Lance, Pidge! Hello?!"

Just static. He spun around in the empty space, looking for any signs of life. Just a few lingering asteroids were within the next mile, some astral body farther off. A dagger of realization struck him hard: the Castle of Lions had disappeared, along with Voltron.

"Is anyone out there?!" He yelled into his radio. He scanned over the asteroids and empty space around him, hoping to see anything other than floating rocks.

Maybe the floating rocks were the only place to start. The jetpack on his back ignited with a blue flame, propelling him forward to the asteroids. The flame quickly ceased, but inertia kept him moving to them. He bumped the nearest rock and clung to it with two hands.

"Where would they have gone?" He muttered, keeping his eyes on the porous rock. A dreadful thought fell over him. "Did we... did we not beat Zarkon...?" The idea of Zarkon still prevailing even after the recovery of the black bayard and all of the effort they'd pushed with the Blade of Marmora was too much for Shiro to process. He discarded the thought immediately and told himself, "We couldn't have lost. The sword was in his armour, he couldn't have survived..."

With the bayard in hand, Shiro finally gained that last ounce of hope he'd needed in their fight against the Galra dictator. The Black Lion had revealed its console for the bayard and finally trusted Shiro enough to reveal its ethereal wings. Keith had already used his bayard to spawn Voltron's blade and Shiro was finally able to contribute as more than just the head. He spawned its blazing sword.

Shiro blanked for a mere moment. The bayard. He still had no idea how it worked. His fellow paladins were each given one, and then handled the weapons like they were trained to use them. But he'd only ever had this arm.

It didn't spawn into his hand like the others would. He tapped his leg as if expecting the armour to react and hand it over. Shiro was never told how the bayards worked, nor was he ever dying to know. Now would've been a great time to understand.

He shook his head and focused his gaze back onto the comet. His gloved fingers were tucked into its pores, keeping him secure on the rock. His suit was a great source of protection from the cold of space, but he still felt the freezing grip just centimeters away from his flesh.

He glanced back up, stars flashing as they reflected off his helmet. There was a moon or some other planet nearby. Well, nearby as in if the Black Lion were here, he could reach it in just a few seconds. But with only a jetpack, possibly damaged, it'd take him days just to penetrate the atmosphere. It was something he wanted to avoid, or he'd plummet to his death.

Shiro thought for a moment, would he truly would die if he just let himself fall back to the ground? The planet surely had a strong pull of gravity, being as big as it was. He could see gray clouds swirling on its surface, an indication of either overcast or rain. Perhaps he could let himself fall until he was nearer to the surface, and then use his jetpack to hover the rest of the way down.

No. That wouldn't work. He'd gain way too much velocity just entering the atmosphere. Being in free-fall for that long without a trustworthy stopping force would most certainly kill him. He'd hit the ground too hard, or his jetpack would malfunction and that'd be it. For as hard as Shiro tried to stay alive, it still seemed like the universe was against him. Why did everything have to be so difficult? Even mundane tasks, like going to eat with his friends would turn into some sort of training exercise meant to bond him with his team. Or if he just wanted to get to know his lion better, he'd get trapped in the void and have to fight an evil alien dictator. Not to mention how he'd never gotten to rest since Zarkon was able to track the Black Lion. Everywhere they went, he followed.

Shiro didn't want to blame himself. He couldn't help but feel some sort of guilt that his lion was putting everyone else in danger. Pidge suspected it from the beginning, but Shiro was too doubtful to admit that he believed her. He wanted to believe what Coran said, that a paladin and their lion couldn't connect over vast distances. And who else but Keith to disprove his theory. If Shiro hadn't taken his role as the Black Paladin, he never would have unleashed Zarkon's potential to track them everywhere they went.

Thinking of the Black Lion made him lonely. He had gotten used to hearing its voice, fighting with it, alongside all of his friends. And even if he didn't have a bayard, he felt like he was all the Black Lion needed to be considered a fantastic weapon. Where was his lion? Where were the OTHER lions? Zarkon's fleet? Did they really take it all out in one blow? And if they did, why did they leave Shiro behind?

The asteroid was making its probably normal course around the planet. Shiro watched the planet turn as the rock moved forward through space. The sun on the other side of the planet, quite a distance away, illuminated the entire other side. But it also cast a shadow. He couldn't see the sun anymore.

In front of the yellow sphere was the outline of a ship. It didn't look like any vessel he was familiar with. He couldn't see any specific details aside from the meteorites drifting around it, the ship appearing only as a black silhouette against the sun. His eyes lit up with hope that he might find some way to get back to his friends. His jetpack ignited and he propelled himself towards the ship, letting go of his rock and drifting through the empty air.

He was able to make out the color blue on the side of the ship, but not very clearly what with all the asteroids and debris in the field of vision. His body bonked against a few of the rocks, but he used them to further propel himself towards the ship.

The ship loomed closer and Shiro was feeling hopeful. Perhaps someone aboard would know how to contact the Blade of Marmora. Or maybe even Allura and the other paladins. But hopes of him finding anyone aboard the ship began to diminish. The sun was less harsh on his eyes and he could now properly see that the asteroids around the ship were fragments of the ship itself.

He didn't know how to react. The ship had been torn apart, evidently. By what, he had no idea. The bent parts of the ship looked like something had slammed into the side of it with a giant knife or maybe even an ion cannon. If there were any exterior lights, they must've been shut down when the ship was attacked. The exterior was pitch black against the yellow sun.

He was only a feet meters away when he rotated enough that he could activate his jetpack and lessen his velocity. It didn't stop him as fast as he'd hoped and he smacked into the side of the ship, his head hitting the front of his helmet with much force.

Just get in the ship, he had to tell himself. He wanted so badly to take his helmet off and feel anything aside from his hot breath in his face. He hadn't even realized he had been breathing so harshly and told himself to stop it. He finally got himself to calm down and started drifting up the side of the ship. He grabbed onto the edge of the vessel, gliding in. 

The hallway was dark, except for the sunlight leaking through the crevices of the broken armour. He ran his hands across the walls to guide himself. Light was gradually disappearing and he had to use a light equipped on his wrist to navigate through the ship. He had passed many closed doors and tried to pry some open. He'd successfully managed with one, but only found a tool kit inside. Useful, perhaps, to repair his arm if he ever needed to. But he wouldn't take off this suit in the middle of a damaged spaceship.

With every room he passed, he realized each one had a bunk and desk inside, much like the Castle of Lions. People lived in this ship. There must've been a kitchen somewhere, and a place to train. But that means there also must've been a main command room. And if it was anywhere, it was at the bridge of the ship.

He tried to keep track of how many turns he was making in case he needed to find his way back out, but eventually gave up and tried to navigate only on wit. He took many wrongs turns and had to back-track until he'd stumbled onto a larger than the rest door, with a strange emblem on its exterior. It wasn't one Shiro could recognize, but he still felt he'd seen it before.

He expected the doors to open automatically, as they did back at the Castle. No movement and he banged his hand on the exterior, hoping they'd come back to life. Still no movement and he started to pry the doors open. He shoved his hands in between the two frames and forced his body in-between them. The paladin was surprised by how strong the doors were holding and started groaning as he had to put in more effort than he normally would to open a door. He ended up using one of his legs to unhinge the doors completely. It was as if they were locked and him pushing just that last bit made them loosen up completely. They slid back behind the walls with a bang and left Shiro planking in zero gravity.

He twisted his body around and got a decent view of the room. It was mostly dark, but the light on his wrist illuminated the room. There was a central console in the center of the wall on the opposite side of the room, along with a giant screen. Next to it appeared to be an abandoned space suit that someone had forgotten to put away. But he was doubtful that someone would just abandon ship without their suit. His gray eyes narrowed and he drifted closer until he was able to see that the suit wasn't empty.

All at once, Shiro felt sick. He tried to look away from the corpse, but couldn't bring himself to do it. His body froze. He kept thinking to himself that he had to get out of the room, right now. Whatever killed this person was going to kill him next. But every ounce of logic he had left in him was overridden by a sense of guilt and disgust. Why did he die? Why did he HAVE to die? What happened to him? What would've happened if I'd been here? What could I have done differently?

His hands started shaking, even his metal one, which shouldn't have responded like that. It wasn't a real limb. It was a pitiful replacement for the one that the Galra stole from him. Memories were rushing back behind his eyes. The first time he'd gone into the Arena and was named a Champion. His foe, Myzax, who was ready to kill just to maintain his rank. 

Shiro wasn't easily startled, and especially not by a blood wound. He'd experienced plenty in his youth. But he'd never purposely hurt someone else like he had with a sword. Myzax had been getting closer and closer with every orb that he fired off. When he was just close enough, and had finally launched his third strike, Shiro wasn't delaying any more. He was either gonna die or he was going to win.

Shiro paid close attention to where the sword was going to land on his opponent's body. Myzax wasn't easy to get close to. Every time Shiro had gotten just a meter close, Myzax swung his massive arms out and struck Shiro across the arena. And everytime he'd fallen, he could feel some part of his body swelling up with pain or one of his bones shattering upon contact. He realized brute strength wouldn't win him the fight and he'd begun to recognize the pattern.

Shiro dove out from behind the cover of a pillar, keeping agile on his feet. Myzax swung his scepter out at Shiro, who quickly ducked beneath the sword-like object. Shiro reared the sword up above his head. His foe swung his free arm out, attempting to grab Shiro by any means before he could get in any kind of blow. But he couldn't move fast enough. He'd been griping at the scepter to get the orb to attack Shiro, but it was still recharging.

Shiro swung the blade down onto Myzax and the blade pierced the Gladiator's skin. That sickening sound as the sword drew through his flesh, embedding a permanent scar into Myzax's face and body, resonated with the painful screech coming from his throat. Shiro hardly reacted to the sight. Blood drenched the blade and covered Shiro's arms. He fell back on his feet and stumbled away, waiting for Myzax to make another move.

The Gladiator shook his head violently and roared at Shiro. He then dove towards the former pilot, arms open as if he was going to hug Shiro to death.

He jumped back, not expecting the random attack. But thought nothing of it, only how he was going to make this fight end already. What did these aliens want? Blood? Well, they've seen plenty of it now, haven't they? Shiro was not only covered in his opponent's blood, but his own as well. There was a gash on his head, and he could feel the trickle of the red liquid down the side of his face. What more did they want?

Myzax stood up again and ran at Shiro, not even bothering to try with the orb again. He was purely enraged. Shiro could already see how open he was to be attacked. He knew where to strike.

As the Gladiator fumbled his way to Shiro, he had already forgotten just how agile his opponent was. Shiro waited until centimeters were the only distance left between them. And at last, as Myzax wrapped his arms, he dove to the side and rolled across the ground. Myzax hugged the empty air where Shiro stood and was impaled by the sword from behind.

He fell flat to the cold floor, staining the metal panels with his own blood. Painful moans escaped his mouth, but no matter how much he cried, Shiro didn't even flinch. He stared down at the monster, seemingly proud of his accomplishment.

All the Galra in the stadium were either dead silent or completely horrified by the sight. They had seen killings before in the arena, but this Champion. He had been around for decophebes and this was his defeat? At the hands of some human castaway? One, much less, that was fresh from being captured. How could such an inferior species take down their Gladiator with so much ease and confidence?

Shiro jerked his head away from the memory. He finally ripped his eyes off the corpse and looked away, to the corner of the room. Where all three surfaces met. I'm not like that, he told himself. I'm not- I didn't want to hurt anyone. I did what I did for myself. For Matt. And for everyone back home.

He took in some shaky breaths until he was able to stop hugging himself. He turned back around and looked upon the skeleton. A monocle was sitting on their skull, their helmet just to their side. He tried to look past the corpse at the actual space suit. It wasn't one Shiro could recognize. No identifiable emblem besides the insignia that was on the door.

He looked towards the actual control board. It looked as if the entire ship had lost power, but perhaps he could change that. He placed his prosthetic hand onto the dashboard and it illuminated pink. The screen blinked before powering back on. It was a video log of someone.

"We located the second comet based on King Alfor's information. We managed to get it aboard, but it seems to be causing massive disturbances." The screen was flickering with static and tinted a light pink, most likely due to Shiro's power source. "We're heading back to Altea, but I don't know if we'll be able to make it that far. At this rate--" On screen, the man was illuminated in a bright light, almost like an explosion. It engulfed him as he screamed and the video was cut short. 

The room turned dark again, without the light from the video feed. Shiro looked back down at the console, almost in disbelief. This man was an Altean? But Princess Allura and Coran are the only Alteans left. This ship must've been extremely old. 

He turned to the rest of the room and noticed all the scraps of machinery and metal on the floor. There was a panel in the ceiling missing. Gun blasts coated the walls, like there was a firefight. But nothing looked to be severely damaged. How did that Altean die if nothing else in the room was hurt?

Shiro turned back to the console and tried to power it, enough so that he could access its data logs. The screen kept flickering, but it wouldn't turn on anymore. 

"Come on, please..." He muttered. The screen remained stagnant, refusing to give the paladin what he wanted. Shiro couldn't get the ship to power on anymore than he had. 

He stared at the console, his grey eyes displaying his despair. He hovered in the air without any force of gravity to bring him closer to the walls, and lifted his hand away. Maybe he just needed some time to breathe. 

What happened just before he passed out? Zarkon had lost the Black Bayard. Shiro had taken it for himself, and slammed it into the console of the Black Lion. Zarkon grabbed hold of Voltron and.... that was it.

That was all Shiro could remember before he woke up in the dead space. Perhaps Zarkon managed to throw Shiro out of the Black Lion again, much like he had when they first tried to infiltrate his ship.

"Throw your weapons to the side and put your hands where I can see them!" Someone yelled. Shiro thought it must've been a passing memory, but the sound was all too real. He threw his hands up on instinct and tried to turn around to see who was shouting. 

"DON'T YOU MOVE!" They shouted again. Shiro ceased any struggle he might've had, a cold fear piercing his heart. Odds are whoever was threatening him was armed, unlike he was. All he had was his hand and a glitchy suit of paladin armour. He hadn't tried his shield yet and was wondering if it would even work. 

The sound of jets came closer and a light flashed over Shiro. Something peaked from the edge of his vision and threw the light into his eyes. Shiro winced and looked away. 

"You're... you're not armed?" They asked, confused. "How did you even get here, where's your ship?" 

Shiro didn't want to talk to them, but realized he had no other choice. "I don't know. I was with my friends when we got... attacked and--" He stopped himself and tried to come up with a better story. "Our ship got attacked and I passed out. When I woke up, I was floating out here, near this one." 

"Pretty sure our scanners would've picked up another ship passing by this area. Why don't you try a different story?" They sounded confident in their speech and certainly in their gesture, rendering Shiro blind with their search light. 

"I'm not lying. I don't know anything else." 

They were silent. Shiro was starting to fear their brutality, like they might shoot him at any second and that'd be it. Would he have enough time to react and get his shield in between the bullet and his body? Would his shield even work? Could he dodge the bullet with his jetpack or--

They lowered the light, letting Shiro see something like a face behind their helmet. Their eyes were pale and tired, like they hadn't slept in days. The only other recognizable feature were colorful markings underneath their eyes. 

"You're... you're Altean." He stared in disbelief. 

"And you're a human." They said back. "Humans shouldn't be out this far... unless you're part of the Guns of Gamara!" They raised their weapon again. 

"I don't know what that is!" He brought both his hands up to hopelessly shield his body from any bullet fire. 

"What, were you part of some sort of slave transport and they left you behind? And what are you wearing, that's not proper seal attire! You could die wearing that!" 

Shiro looked down at his suit. It did look horrible. The gloves seemed to be thinning out, like they could crack open at any moment and his hands would be frozen solid. The armour casing on his chest was beaten, and the glass on his helmet wasn't easy to see out of, being so scratched up. 

"Well... just come with me." They lowered their weapon and turned back to the door. Jets on their back propelled them towards it. They slid between the opening that Shiro had made on his way through. Shiro followed suit, but felt uneasy. 

They drifted through the halls. The Altean kept looking down each hallway, expecting something to be there. But every hallway was dark and unseeable. They kept moving forward. 

"You entered through this room?" They asked, pointing towards the expansive, observatory ahead of them. "I dunno how you would've gotten any of the other doors open."

"Y-Yeah." Shiro stuttered, staring up at the ceiling. The hole in the roof of the ship was much bigger than he thought. It might've been big enough for an entire, smaller ship to fit through. 

"Do you know anything about this specific ship?" They turned and stared at him, looking concerned. 

"Nothing at all..." He was still taken aback by the sheer size of the ship and how it could've taken so much damage. What was strong enough to cause a hole like that in a ship like this? 

They sighed. The Altean lifted their wrist up and banged on their helmet with their knuckles. "Commander, are you there?" He waited for a reply that Shiro couldn't hear. "Second Class Private Norteia reporting. The biorhythm in the abandoned transport ship is a stray human. I'm bringing them back to the ship." 

Shiro couldn't hold his curiosity in anymore. "You're an actual Altean?" 

Norteia, as they seemed to be called, stared at the human with wide-eyed confusion. "Is such surprising?" 

"Yes, actually!" Shiro was appalled by the response. "Are there more of you?!" He sounded desperate now.

"I would certainly hope so..." Norteia responded with some sort of disgust. "If not Alteans, who else is helping retrieve you and bring you home?" 

"So, you know Princess Allura?" A small smile peaked on his lips.

The Altean's eyes narrowed. "What does it mean to you?" Their hands stiffened just a bit on their gun. 

"The Princess, she knows me. My name is Shiro, can you get me into contact with her?" He was feeling hopeful. Knowing that the Princess was alive, and that she may have even found other surviving Alteans, was enough to lift the paladin out of his dreariness.

"You're calling her a princess... the least you could do is use her proper title..." They scoffed and averted eye contact with Shiro. 

Shiro felt some sort of drop in his chest, but couldn't exactly pinpoint the emotion. He was going to push for further explanation, but Norteia lifted their gun closer to their chest and looked up through the hole in the ship. "Do your jets still function properly?"

Shiro nodded and hastily followed the Altean as they flew threw the gap. Just outside the hull of the ship was another one, of identical mass and structure, but intact. It was drifting, but had slowed down enough for the two to latch onto the side of it.

Shiro was having issues keeping up. Unlike the Altean's jetpack, Shiro's had less stamina. It needed to recharge every few seconds after use, lest he run out of fuel entirely. He was a whole 5 seconds behind the Altean and had barely latched onto the ship in time. 

"Prepare for entry." They muttered eyeing the side of the ship. Shiro looked at the same area and noticed that thin line in the center of the plating. They were bay doors into the ship. On almost perfect queue, the doors began to open. The Altean drifted inside and Shiro followed, much closer this time. 

They hovered above the ground for a moment before the gravity kicked back in. All of Shiro's weight came back suddenly and he staggered, surprised by the sudden force on his legs. The hangar they were in was big enough to hold probably an escape pod. It was dark gray and blue lights illuminated what areas they could. Crates covered the walls, maybe full of supplies or weapons, etc. There were other Alteans standing about, some around crafts of some sort. Many were holding cargo boxes and a few had already began to eye the new-comer. 

Someone came up to Norteia, after they'd finished talking to another. They kept glancing at Shiro, then averting their gaze whenever they made eye contact. Shiro didn't know what to do or if he should be doing anything at all. He stood still and averted eye contact, trying his best not to catch glimpses.

Norteia finished their conversation then turned to Shiro with their partner at their shoulder. He could see Norteria was dark-toned, like the Princess. Their hair was swept to the side and a bright pastel blue, a good contrast to their pink-ish Altean marks and eyes. Their comrade, however, didn't look Altean aside from the marks under their eyes. 

Their skin was a pale blue, bleeding into the uniform they wore. Long hair was drawn back in a bundle on the back of their head. Their long ears, pointed, stuck out from the side of their head. It didn't help that their eyes were staring straight through Shiro. They seemed disgusted at the sight. 

"Take off your helmet." They commanded. Their voice was striking and bold. Shiro didn't hesitate and pulled the helmet off his head. Their voices were no longer muffled and his gaze wasn't tinted blue. It was easier to tell that their skin wasn't blue but just a pale brown. Still, it didn't seem natural. 

He didn't realize it, but his face was drenched in sweat, like the inside of his suit was burning him alive. Shiro's face was red, but he didn't seem phased at all by it. The white tuft of hair on the bridge of his head was stuck to his face.

The Altean noticed immediately. "Are you.... ill?" They asked, almost backing away.

"He's delusional...." Norteia muttered, glaring at the human. "He says he knows Empress Allura, personally. Requested an audience with her." 

"Oh, come on, humans aren't that stupid, are they?" 

"I'm telling the truth!" Shiro intervened. The two Alteans looked back at Shiro, surprised by his outburst. "I know the Princess." He was struggling to come up with something to convince them of his status. "You've heard of Voltron, haven't you?" 

They stared at Shiro, almost shocked by his words. "Sorry, Voltron?" The pale one asked. "Do you... believe in child's tales? Come on, I wouldn't think humans are so daft."

He was at a loss for words. Not in disbelief, but utter confusion. Did these Alteans not know that Voltron existed? Their king used to be one of its paladins. It was part of their history, they had to know the name. 

"I'm.... I'm one of the paladins of Voltron, you can ask the Princess." Shiro wasn't entirely sure of his own words. If these people haven't heard of Voltron, they probably do think that he's delusional. "I'm the pilot of the Black Lion, my name is Shiro, just ask her." 

The pale one finished her snicker and put her hands on her hips, almost like she was examining him. "Okay then, Shiro." She smiled at him, which seemed nicer than her cold glare. "I'll do my best. Private Norteia will escort you to a place of safe-keeping, in the meantime." 

"Wait, really?" Norteia muttered. "Do you.... believe him?" 

She tapped his shoulder and nodded, then walked away without another word. Norteia stared after her and sighed. "Follow me." 

Shiro was hesitant and kept staring after the other Altean. They didn't look like Coran or Allura or Norteia, but they had the markings. They had to be, but something was off. He couldn't pinpoint if it was their character or their appearance. Shiro left the thought behind in the hangar and followed Norteia. 

They went down a long strip of doors and hallways, which only further reminded him of the Castle of Lions. Even the lights on the walls were the same shade of blue. The sound of his boots clanging against the metal floor was the same. This was a real Altean ship. 

"You don't need to worry about her, by the way." Shiro was almost startled by Norteia's words. "The Commander likes to mess with other people. She just asked me to take you to a proper dorm for the time being." The Altean had spun around and was walking backwards down the hall. They were at least an entire 12 inches shorter than Shiro, which was a trait that normally belonged to Pidge. 

The thought of Pidge's short stature made Shiro feel lonely immediately. She was always so optimistic about going on missions and helping other people. It was hard to believe that she was the same person that wanted to abandon the team to go looking for her brother and father. 

Shiro was probably the only one that knew, but Pidge had never given up that search. He was fully aware that, whatever Galra base they were infiltrating, Pidge was at the main computer, extracting any data she could find on her brother or father. He'd often times wanted to stall the mission out to give her more time to search, but this seemed fruitless. Pidge always came back with no leads. Except for their mission to go find Slav. 

Pidge had stumbled across security footage of Matt being broken out of a Galran prison. She wasn't able to identify anyone else in the footage, but told Shiro that, as soon as Zarkon was defeated, she'd go looking for them. Wherever Pidge was right now, Shiro hoped that she had strong leads on where her family was. 

"Hey.... human." Norteia waved a hand in front of Shiro's blank eyes.

Shiro's head snapped up. "S-sorry." 

"You're not worried about the Commander still, are you? She means well..." Norteia pushed the buttons to open the dorm. "I mean, not everyone we pick up gets a dorm on a ship. Consider yourself lucky." 

"Thank you." Shiro still didn't know how to talk to him, but tried to keep conversation minimal. He stepped into the room and a feeling of nostalgia overwhelmed him. It was just like his room back in the Castle of Lions. But much more barren than he would've liked. 

The door slammed shut behind him, making him jump. His helmet fell out of his arms and banged against the floor, making an echo. He looked down at it, almost surprised. The floors in the Castle of Lions weren't hollow like that. Maybe they just did it for extra storage. Shiro didn't care anymore. 

He sat down on the bed. The mattress was stiff, like it hadn't been used in forever. But it was better than the cold vaccum of space. Shiro set his helmet down on the floor next to the bed and slowly unlatched pieces of his armour from his body. He didn't dare remove the leather suit underneath all the white and black plating, but was happy to be able to fully move his back and arms. 

After just a few seconds of stretching, he laid back on the bed. It was built in the wall and had a fixed length, so he was worried his legs wouldn't fit into the bed without being bent. But that didn't matter. As soon as his head hit the pillow, Shiro's eyes fell heavy and he started to sleep. 

He thought he heard voices, but assumed they were part of some dream. He didn't try to open his eyes, hoping to cling to whatever sleep there was available to his tired body. He couldn't remember the last time he'd actually slept. Maybe when he was dragged into the void to fight Zarkon head-on, but he didn't count that. Mentally, he was tired after that. Therefore, not real sleep. 

As Shiro seemed to get lost in another dream, the voice started up again.

"I'm almost certain this room was the right room." 

"Were you not certain until we checked every other room?"Another voice scolded.

"I like to be certain of things. It helps me feel safe." 

"You're most weird.... Is there anyone in the room?" 

"Check the bed." 

At this point, Shiro couldn't ignore the voices anymore. But he didn't dare give any indication that he was awake. He kept his eyes shut but was ready to jump up at any moment. Their footsteps were approaching, each tap on the floor getting ever-so slightly louder. Shiro felt them standing over his bed, but was scared to open his eyes in case they tried to kill him instantly. 

"Ehhhhh, looks human?" They muttered. Something bright flashed over Shiro's face, he could feel the warmth on his skin. "I mean, he looks weird for a human, but he doesn't look Altean." 

"What would you know about humans?" The other person seemed upset. "We shouldn't be here. Let's report to the Commander." 

Shiro was very tempted to shoot up and try to pin one of them down, but not for the fear of being killed by them. Because he was very annoyed with one of them already. The natural instinct of hearing the voice made him want to throw them across the room. Not that he'd be able to, since they'd hug onto his body if any threat were ever presented to them. 

"I may not have seen too many humans before, but I don't think they're supposed to be this close in appearance." 

"What?" 

That was it, that brief moment of lack of communication was the moment to strike. Shiro was both afraid and annoyed to put up with being blind any longer. He bent his legs up, which were still padded with armour that he'd neglected to take off. Using the force, he pushed off the side of the bed and collided with a body, wrapping both his arms around them. He brought them down to the floor and they yelled in terror, squirming in his grasp. Multiple limbs battered at Shiro, trying to make him let go, but to no avail. Shiro's metal arm was clasped in a ring with his flesh one around the body. 

Shiro finally tried opening his eyes, almost blinded immediately. The flashlight had fallen out of their arms and was illuminating a corner of the room, where the other person was standing. 

"AGH, LET GO OF ME!" They squirmed in his grasp, tugging at Shiro's arms. Shiro looked away from the light and caught glimpse of the one person who's made him lose his cool. 

"Slav, stop struggling!" Shiro barked, still not letting go. Slav made eye contact with Shiro, his small yellow beak seemed to frown at Shiro despite not being a fully fleshed out mouth. He glared at Shiro. 

"How do you know him." The stoic voice of the other sounded behind Shiro. He slowly turned and held Slav in his grip, not daring to loosen it in case Slav might actually hurt him. His attacker was holding a gun, aimed directly at Shiro's chest. He couldn't see their face all that well, but what he could see didn't help him identify them.

"This is Slav, isn't it?" Shiro panted. Slav kept struggling and only squirmed harder when Shiro started talking, prompting Shiro to tighten his grip just a little more. "I saved him from Beta Traz, a Galra prison." 

The other didn't lower their weapon, but muttered, "The blue one said the same thing." They glanced over at the scraps of Shiro's armour near the bed. "They were all wearing something like that."

Shiro looked at his armour. "Wait, the other paladins. You saw them?" Shiro's brief moment of hope let Slav break free from his grip. Shiro tried to reach for Slav again, but he'd already jumped away, behind his other friend, to safety from Shiro's annoyed grasp. 

"So you know them?" Slav asked. Slav dropped his defensive stance and left the safety of his friend "I guess that explains your appearance." 

"Slav, what are you talking about?" The other asked.

Slav turned to his friend and glared. "Perhaps if you two actually looked in a mirror." 

He looked back at Shiro, who hadn't dared to avert his gaze. He'd overlooked the rest of his face, only noticing the white hair and scar across his nose. But now that he looked closer, he could see some similarities to his reflection.

He lowered his gun. "Are you the one they called, 'Shiro'?"

Without the bright flashlight from the gun practically blinding Shiro, he could get a real look at his stalkers. Slav wasn't wearing what he was before. This looked more like some sort of battle armour. There were green emblems on his shoulders, glowing like the blue accents on the paladin armour. 

The other was wearing the same suit, of course, fitted to his body. He was of the same stature as Shiro. Perhaps the only real difference in appearance between the two was Shiro's white hair. 

"If you are with those others.... then I suppose you're safe." Slav sighed and looked at Shiro with sad eyes. "You already know me, apparently. Shiro, this is Sven."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHAHAHAHHAHAHAH  
> bet you're confused huh
> 
>  
> 
> or maybe you're not and you know exactly what i'm doing AHAHAHAHAHHAHA


	5. The Blue Paladin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After their rather short "family dinner," the Paladins of Voltron take up their creed to investigate a hidden Galra prison that was currently under operations by rogue Galra soldiers. Keith, Pidge, Lance and Allura take arms and enter the facility, quickly discovering that the prisoners inside were of high priority for the Galra to keep imprisoned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooof, I managed to write this one in less than two weeks! Heh, the ending was messy though. I got the sudden urge to write while I was in class and ripped out my laptop to do so. Here's the result ;)))

The mood at the table was cheery and light-hearted. As soon as Keith had walked into the room, Hunk tackled the poor boy in a hug, quite possibly shattering his ribcage. Keith yelped, but was mute compared to Hunk's cries of happiness.

"Keith, you're here!!" Hunk laughed with lil' tears falling down his cheeks.

Keith's hands twitched and he forced a smile, his long black hair dripping over his scared eyes. "Good to see you...big man."

Keith was situated in a seat next to Coran and Matt and was enjoying a cup of cattie varse. Lance was telling stories about what they'd been doing since Keith left.

"So, all the vines were wrapped around everyone but me-" Lance made a hand motion like he was grabbing one of the shifters of the Red Lion. "So I couldn't get the sword, 'cause Pidge was caught. So I charged up a giant laser and shot it straight through the beast!"

"Yeah, I couldn't even tell what was happening." Hunk chided, pushing one of his plates over as he moved his arm. "I just heard Lance screaming and then everything went white. It was REALLY cool."

Keith smiled lightly. Allura could tell he was enjoying the company of familiar friends. She silently hoped that maybe he had wanted to come home this whole time and just needed someone to push him. She was thankful for Pidge who invited both Keith and Matt. Pidge's older sibling had made quite the romantic gesture earlier, toasting to Allura's royal status and charm. Allura was shocked by the comments, but in a nice way. She almost liked the praise, but tried to stay humble. And humble though she was, someone else was being too quiet. 

"Keith, certainly you have some interesting stories?" Allura intervened before Lance could continue with praising himself, which he was fond of. 

Keith was taken aback, clearly confused by Allura's comment. He stared down at his cup of cattie varse, making a motion where the liquid would circle the sides of the cup. "Uh, I dunno. It's not.... It's not super exciting. I'm usually just following others around and helping with the mission." He looked up from his cup. Everyone was staring at him. "Is... something wrong?"

"You have to have done something cooler than just... follow other people." Hunk said.

Keith looked slightly flustered. "Well, I.... Uh.... I dunno. I haven't really... gone on too many solo missions. There was one, I guess, that stood out. Uh, it was after Lotor was on the throne. I got sent to a research facility to find some weapon made out of quintessence." 

Everyone seemed to be leaning in closer. Interest was piqued. "I met with another blade that was working under-cover. She and I had to get the weapon out of the facility, or destroy it." He glanced down at his cup again and gave himself a little smile. "She was... really nice. And definitely knew how to fight. I've been going on a few missions with here ever since. And I've even talked to her on the side."

Allura was beaming with joy. She hadn't seen Keith so happy in such a long time. It was refreshing to see a smile on his face again. A rare sight. The Altean princess looked across the faces at the table and hoped to see something similar. But out of all the happy faces, Lance's stood out the most. He looked offset, like something about the mission was bothering him.

"She's Galra, isn't she?" Lance commented. "You two could be, like, related." Allura scoffed silently to herself. Of course Lance was jealous that Keith had found a friend. 

Keith stared ahead with confusion draped on his face, as if his next statement was obvious. "Uh, yeah... In fact, we are. She's my mom." 

Glasses slammed against the table. Pidge jumped from her seat onto the table and started yelling. Hunk was already screaming. Shiro had almost spilled the cup he was holding with his one hand. "Y-you're certain that's her?"

"The same mother that left you when you were little?" Lance asked.

"Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh-" Hunk was fanning himself with tears running down his face.

Keith nodded and asked, "What's wrong, is this weird?"

"Keith, that's incredible!" Matt stood up, pushing his chair away from him in the process. "That's great that you found her!"

"I'm glad you found her." Allura composed herself enough that she could say anything besides overjoyed squealing.

"You need to invite her over sometime!" Pidge pointed her hand at Keith, as if accusing him of something. 

Keith stiffened up. "I dunno if she'd really like to-"

"What's the harm in offering?" Shiro said. "Maybe she wants to meet all of us." 

"Well, who wouldn't want to meet the defenders of the universe?" Coran messed with his mustache with no humbleness present. 

"I guess I can ask. But don't get upset if she says no." Keith took another drink of the cattie varse. His face was turning red. 

"What's her name?" Hunk was finally able to form sentences again without his voice cracking more than twice. 

"What does she look like?" Lance added. He seemed to be more at ease now.

"It's Krolia." Keith leaned his elbows on the table. "She looks kinda like me, but, y'know, she's Galra. So she's got pointy ears, purple skin... She's got these two long marks that go down the sides of her face." Keith dragged his hand down the side of his own face like the others could see it.

"She's really good with a sword. She took the one I have and hacked up a bunch of sentries like they were paper. And she's.... she's caring." He smiled to himself.

Allura couldn't help herself. "How'd you know she was your mother?" 

Keith met the multi-colored eyes of the Princess. "I, uh.... She practically had to tell me." 

"Sounds like you.... Oblivious." Lance smirked.

Keith shot a glare at the red paladin and said, "I'm feeling so welcome." Keith sighed to himself and messed with his cup more. "What is this stuff again? It's really good."

"Cattie varse. Had to go through a troublesome merchant to get it. Lance helped spice it up though." Hunk motioned towards his friend, who seemed to be priding himself.

"I'm assuming you made the food, Hunk? It tastes great." 

"Actually, everyone was helping on that end. I was making the bread, Pidge and Shiro had a salad covered, Lance was on drinks and-"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. Shiro? You were helping?"

Everyone seemed shocked by Keith's comment. Shiro looked hurt, but tried his best to keep a straight face. "Is that... surprising?"

Allura felt bad for Shiro immediately. She wanted to reassure him that he did a fine job helping, even if he only had one arm at the moment. Keith had averted his gaze quickly and said, "Nothing, sorry." Allura couldn't tell what Keith was going at, and she spoke up.

"What was wrong with Shiro's assistance?" She leaned on the table, trying to make eye contact with Keith's hidden eyes. 

"Well, he..." Keith trailed off for a moment. He took a deep breath and exhaled, sitting up straight. "I'm sorry if this seems rude... but Shiro used to be really awful at cooking back at the Garrison. I guess I'm just..." Keith glanced at his friend again and smiled lightly. "I'm glad he's doing better." 

The room fell silent for a moment. Everyone still seemed paralyzed by Keith's abrupt comment, and Allura almost wanted to ask him what was wrong. But she didn't. No one did. 

The conversation picked up again. Pidge started going off about how they found her dad. She talked about the fight in the spaceship and how they'd managed to get back to the surface of the planet safely. And in excruciating detail, she described how Lotor killed his father. 

"-straight through his chest plate! His heart must've stopped, instantly! There was quintessence leaking out of his suit and maybe even-"

"PIDGE!" Her brother reached over the table and grabbed her arm, stopping her. "You're gonna make your friends sick." 

Allura was already feeling queasy, but she thought she was the only one. Looking up, she could see everyone seemed upset. Keith looked ready to spit out the rest of his drink and Hunk was holding a hand over his mouth. Pidge glanced as well, then scoffed for a moment. "It was cool though...."

"It was horrible." Matt muttered. "Can we... just change the subject?"

"You got something cool to talk about?" Pidge crossed her arms, pulling them away from her brother's reach. 

Matt leaned back in his chair and mimicked her movements. "Yes, in fact!" He exclaimed. "I'm glad we got a party going, 'cause everyone needs to hear about this!" 

Keith and Shiro leaned forward to get a better glimpse at Matt, who had already gone into a bag that he'd been carrying. He pulled a small device from the bag and placed it on the table in front of him. From the device, a holographic projection sprouted above the table, letting everyone see. 

The room was illuminated in a bright blue, almost blinding everyone before their eyes adjusted. Matt stood up to start moving the projection around with his hands. Allura was in awe. She could tell what she was looking at. 

"Is this a map... of a prison?" She asked.

Matt nodded. "I only got a scan of the outside of it, from what I could nab. I wasn't able to stay long, or sentries would've found me." He looked down at Allura to reaffirm his claim. 

Allura's eyes widened and she gasped, "This is a Galra base?"

"A rogue one. I can't tell who would've had control of this base, but it's safe to assume that they're VERY hostile." He moved the projection around so everyone could get a closer look at the platform. "Multiple fighter docks and the structure looks like it's supposed to be resistant to bombs. And when I was going over the radio waves, I found a few channels that made mention of.... something or someone important."

"Something that could threaten them?" Keith commented, glaring at the holographic structure. 

"Most likely." Matt said. 

Keith swallowed in some air and said, "Then we should find out what it is." 

Lance and Pidge looked at Keith, a little surprised to hear him talking so passionately. Allura was almost ready to agree to his plan when Shiro put his hand on his shoulder. 

"Wait. You couldn't find any other information on this prison from the Empire? Or over the radio waves?" 

Matt sighed and said, "No. This place was off-limits to average intelligence. I didn't find any records of it even existing." He put his hands on the table. "And you'd think that the emperor would have all the records of every base built.... but even Lotor didn't know this existed." Matt looked back up. "I was going to ask for his assistance to raid it if you guys weren't available." 

"Raid it?" Hunk asked. "Like, attack it and risk getting shot at and killed?"

Lance sighed and said, "Hunk, we've been over this, we pilot giant space lions that are WAY stronger than Galra cruisers. We're not gonna get killed."

"We can help go after it." Allura reaffirmed Matt's hopes, smiling at his passion. He smiled back.

"Where... is it located?" Shiro had already stood up and was looking at the map with closer inspection. "I don't see any coordinates."

"I flew over it on my supply route, I have the coordinates. I could only get close enough to do an exterior scan, so I have no maps of the inside... Once we're in, we might be able to hack into their data records and find out what's going on. From what I could find, though, there's multiple bio-rhythms... Most likely prisoners and Galra soldiers alike."

Keith nodded. "So.... we should sneak in."

Lance scoffed and said, "Seems easier to use the lions to just bust the walls down."

Keith turned to Lance with some sort of emotionless gaze. "You think they wouldn't use the prisoners as ransom?"

Lance stared at his rival, unblinking. "Ransom..."

Pidge muttered to Lance, "They'd kill them if we broke in."

Lance flinched and said, "Y-yeah, I knew that! We wouldn't want that to happen, I know!"

Allura stood at the head of the table and spoke above everyone else. "Then it's settled. We can take any of the lions to the base with the cloaking technology and sneak in.... Be it the fastest, Lance, you should take the Red Lion."

Lance blinked, seemingly confused by her order. "What other lion would I take?"

"None of them. The other lions will stay behind." She looked back to the map. "There's very little room to maneuver, and having multiple lions on the planet would be hard to manage." 

"So... we're sending in Lance... by himself?" The yellow paladin sighed and hit his head on the table. "That's already a nightmare."

Lance jumped from his seat and slammed his hands on the table, "Hey, I'm capable!!" He barked. 

"Lance, you won't go alone. Pidge and Hunk can go with you to supply back-up." Shiro reassured the other paladins. 

Hunk lifted his head off the table. "Uh.... with all due respect, Shiro, I don't think I'm the one who's supposed to go on this kind of a mission..."

Shiro turned back to Hunk, but didn't lose any composure. "Why not?"

Hunk stiffened up a bit. "Well, y'know... I'm like.... I'm not exactly... sneaky." He started poking his fingers together.

Lance broke in. "He's right... The few times we snuck outta the dorms, Hunk was-" Lance stopped talking immediately. "Uh, I mean, when we'd... do, uh, STEALTH simulations! Yeah, Hunk was AWFUL at those, haha!"

Allura was taken aback by Lance's sudden change in story and looked to Shiro for explanation. He just sighed and changed the topic. "Hunk, if you don't want to do it, we won't make you... But someone else should go."

Allura had taken her seat again, but quickly pushed it out from under her as she stood up straight. Two voices said:

"I'll go."

Allura, realizing this, turned her attention to Keith, who had also stood up. "Oh, Keith! I mean.... if you'd like to, go ahead!"

Keith waved his arms in front of him, looking flustered. "No, no, you go! You're the Princess, after all."

"Oh, whaaat? That's not even a real qualification, heh. You're a much more experienced fighter than I am."

"Well, y-you're Altean! How do I compete with that?"

Lance sighed loudly, interrupting the two and heaved, "Why don't you both come with us?" 

The two stared at him and almost smiled at Lance. 

It had only taken roughly 200 ticks before everyone had gotten ready to depart. Matt took control of the Castle and sent it to the collected coordinates, informing Lotor's fleets that they would be entering the area. Lotor reaffirmed their mission and said that a back-up fleet would be ready to assist if the fighting accelerated. Coran assured that wouldn't happen. 

Allura had donned her armor and met with everyone else on the bridge, being one of the first in the room. Before her was Keith, who had brought his Marmoran outfit with him. She wished he'd gone to grab his paladin armor, which was in a case somewhere in the armory. He'd decided to leave it behind when he left for the Blades, reiterating that he wasn't part of Voltron anymore, and therefore, wouldn't need it.

Allura felt guilty about him leaving. He wouldn't have left in the first place if he could still pilot the Red Lion.... If Lance wasn't forced into it. Sometimes, when she flew the Blue Lion around, just for getting a feel of the majestic beast of a ship, she'd feel bad for practically kicking Lance out of it. She didn't think Lance enjoyed piloting the Red Lion. He never took it for flights like he did with the Blue Lion. 

Matt spoke up. "We'll be there soon. Maybe a varga... I'm surprised the place didn't have any sensors on it. It should've picked me up being that close." 

Pidge leaned on her console. "Eh, maybe they just thought you'd leave." She pressed a few buttons. "Not like a missing cargo pilot would raise suspicion or anything." 

Matt huffed and leaned against her chair, almost trying to steal the seat like a sibling would. Allura smiled as Pidge nudged her brother and knocked him onto the floor. Her eyes gleamed as she claimed her seat. 

Allura took stand at the controls for the Castle, the nostalgia all too familiar. Coran had been piloting the Castle whenever they didn't need to use a teleduv to jump. The controls, albeit similar to the Blue Lion, were different. She checked the scanners for nearby cruisers.

"Hmm.... aside from lifeforms on nearby planets, no cruisers had detected us so far..." She stayed stood at the controls, keeping her eyes on the scanners. After a few dobashes had past, she said again, "No cruisers nearby." And again, after many dobashes, "Still no cruisers..."

Hunk had slouched over in his seat, crossing his arms. "Shouldn't we be there by now?"

Matt looked up at the map again. "It's a really small prison, okay? It was a miracle I saw it in the first place, finding it on this map is... difficult." 

"Maybe stop looking at the map and out the window." Lance muttered, pointing outside. Matt and Coran looked past the map and noticed the bundle of rock and metal floating in the distance. 

"WHOA, STOP!" Matt yelled, standing up. Allura quickly pulled back on the ships thrusters and threw everyone forward as she reversed direction. She herself almost fell off the podium. 

"Not a moment too soon." Coran muttered. "Any closer and we might've been spotted." 

Shiro stood up and looked back at his comrades. "Alright, Lance, this is all you from now on. Tell us if anything goes wrong in there." 

Lance stood up and nodded. He looked to the rest of the team and commanded, "Let's go." 

Within minutes Lance, Allura, Keith and Pidge had boarded the Red Lion, with Lance piloting. The Red Lion left one of the spires of the Castle and glided towards the base.

Lance tapped a few buttons on the dashboard of the lion. "Cloaking activated, we're beginning approach." He turned his gaze back to the base and threw both sticks forward. The Red Lion vanished from view, but shot off at great speed toward the base. Allura had grabbed hold on the seat to hold herself steady. Pidge had grabbed her leg and was whimpering at the rapid acceleration. Keith didn't seem phased at all, but his grip tightened on the back of the chair. 

Keith glanced down at Lance, and narrowed his eyes. "Why are you doing that?" He asked. 

Lance turned his head to Keith and asked, "Doing what?"

"You're holding the stick like it's gonna fall out of your hand."

"Yeah, so?" Lance was snide. Allura glanced at what Keith was talking about, noticing that Lance's grip was so strained that his arms were shaking trying to maintain it. She could imagine how pale his skin must've been underneath the gloves.

"If you loosen up a little, it'll be easier to make swift movements. The Red Lion is built around speed, after all." 

Lance held a glare before looking away and loosening his grip. "I'm... not used to his lion yet." He sounded disappointed, but not at Keith. 

Allura wasn't shocked. She lifted her hand and put it on his shoulder. "Lance, it's alright." He looked to his right and up to her eyes. "Just take your time. No judging." She smiled. 

Lance smiled back and looked ahead again. His grip stiffened up for a second before he let his let his arms loosen. The Red Lion didn't seem to shake as much now. Lance seemed to have much better control of the lion's movements.

30 ticks went by and Lance announced, "We're heading in for a landing, where am I?"

Matt's voice rang out over the comms. "Head past the main building, there should be an empty plot of land big enough for the lion. Once you're out, you're gonna have to run to the main building, we can't risk a patrol finding one of the speeders."

Everyone nodded. The Red Lion took a seat on the rock and lowered its jaw to the dusty floor. The Paladins had pulled their helmets on and Keith donned his mask. They slid down the ramp and onto the floor, beginning their trek across the planet's crust. Behind them, the lights on the Red Lion faded away and its shield rose up around it.

Keith was agile and the fastest of the whole group, making it to entrance before anyone else had. The two doors were sealed shut, but a control node was nearby. Allura turned her back to her team while Pidge began her work on the door. 

"Keep your eyes open... There could be a patrol anywhere." Shiro's voice was muffled over their radios, but they clearly understood his words. Allura had her bayard in her hand, Lance just behind her with his rifle. The Blue Paladin thought she'd seen a few lights out of the corner of her eye, but every time it was just another one of Pidge's attempts to break into the facility.

It only took her ten ticks and the doors slid open. Keith ran in ahead of everyone, leading the party further into the facility. Pidge trailed behind, closing the door behind her on the way. The room was darkened instantly. 

Lance began to fidget with his wrist guard, to turn on the light so they could see. Allura started to do the same. But as Lance's light flickered on, Keith grabbed his wrist. Lance almost jumped back. Allura stepped away, scared for a moment by his abrupt action.

"What are you doing?" He hissed. "If they see the light, they'll know we're in here!"

Lance turned off the light and leaned in closer to Keith's purple mask, glaring. "How do you expect us to see in here, hothead?"

Allura stepped between the two immediately. "Both of you, quiet." She whispered. "We're looking for the control room, alright? It'll most likely be well lit, we'll see it instantly." Allura turned back around, unable to see which direction was which. "We'll just have to.... go blind for now."

The party stumbled around in the dark for a few dobashes. Every time they got close to a wall, Lance would hit it and almost yell. Pidge had to smack his body a few times to keep him from doing so. Keith stayed near the front with Allura, his purple mask a good flag for where they were heading down the hall.

Allura sighed and muttered, "Okay, maybe a light would be nice..."

"We can't let them know we're here, Princess..." Keith replied. "We're not even supposed to know this place exists. The stuff that's here could be too valuable." He kept his stead up.

Allura huffed and frowned at him. Keith had certainly grown a bit while he was away. He seemed much more concentrated on the mission, being able to pull his mind away from other things. She felt some sort of mixture of pride and sorrow for him, knowing that such characteristics were great to have being in the Blade of Marmora, but also knowing such ideas could get him killed.

Allura dreaded the thought of receiving a call from Kolivan, telling the team that Keith was injured or had even died during a mission. She didn't know if she'd feel worse knowing he died recklessly or with honor. She shook her head and pulled away from the ideas, not wanting to concentrate on something so dark and, at the time, likely. 

Keith had led the whole party down the hall, coming onto a fork in the hallways. "I haven't seen any terminals.... Just a lot of prison blocks."

"There's gotta be something that can show us where to go," Allura muttered. She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall behind her, her armor scraping the metal plating. 

"Oi, if you're looking for the main-" 

The voice was directly behind Allura, so close she almost screamed. She pushed both her legs off the wall and jumped away, spinning around to get a look at her stalker. But she didn't see anyone.

She glanced at the others. Keith already had a hand on the hilt of his knife that hung on his waist. Pidge and Lance were almost hugging each other, probably in fear. "What was that...?" Keith whispered. 

"In here, kid." Allura's eyes twitched to the small patch of darkness on the wall, noticing instantly that it was a hole. There was something shuffling inside it. 

"You're... oh, you're a prisoner." Allura muttered, calming instantly. "My apologies, we're just-"

"Breaking in here?" The voice said. They sounded amused by the tone of their voice. "If you wanna find a map to the facility, head down the right corridor. The main terminal is in the center."

Keith stared at the prisoner through the gap in the door. "How can we trust you on that?"

"What, you think I wanna be locked up in here?" They were annoyed. "My safest bet is that you guys might bring down the Empire if you're breaking in here and stealing their secrets."

"Uh.... yes." Pidge muttered. "How, uh... how long have you been imprisoned here?"

The voice was silent for a few moments. "I'd say maybe.... ah, I dunno, years?"

"Cooooolllll....." Lance looked the other direction. "Weeeellll, we'll be going to the terminal now, thanks for the help, haha." Lance spun on his heel and began walking off, but before he could get any farther, Keith grabbed his wrist.

"Hey, we could try freeing them maybe?" Keith scolded.

"I wouldn't try it." Allura said. "Odds that the entire facility has a system to set off alarms if any cell is opened."

"We can try breaking them out when we get to the main terminal." Pidge said. Keith sighed and agreed, leading the group down the hall.

Allura nodded, letting the three move ahead. She turned back to the cell and looked closer into the gap, hoping to make out any distinct features that could tell her what race she was talking to. But it was just too dark. 

"We'll do our best to get you out of there, as well as anyone else in this facility."

"Thanks, I'm sure we'd appreciate it. But before you run off... who the heck are you people?"

Allura felt some sort of dagger strike her heart. These people locked in this building, they really didn't hear much about the outside world, did they? "My name is Allura of Planet Altea. I'm a paladin of Voltron."

"'Voltron'? I haven't heard of that legend in a long time." They sighed. "Rumors were always going around that the old thing came back to save us, but we've been stuck here so long... Everyone thought it was a ruse. I guess though... it's nice to know salvation wasn't a lie."

Her heart warmed just enough to force a smile on her face. "I promise you, it's not a lie. We'll be back." She turned away from the cell and ran after her friends, almost eager to tell them what he'd said. 

She caught up to Pidge, staying near the rear of the group, her bayard in her hand. As Allura came running, Pidge turned to her and made a hand motion telling her to be quiet. 

Allura slowed her pace and caught on: there were sentries in the next hallway. 

"Okay, I see three sentries," Keith muttered. "They look... different, so be prepared for anything. Lance, you fire a few shots at them, see if you can take them out. But don't shoot past them, we don't want to draw attention" 

"You doubting my aim?" Lance smirked. He lifted his gun up to his shoulder. 

"Yes. Heavily." Keith looked back at him. Lance stopped smirking, lowering the gun. "Just... don't miss." 

"Don't miss... yeah, like it's that easy." Lance muttered. Keith pretended that he didn't hear it. Lance knelt down beside Keith, keeping out of the hallway. Allura could hear the sentries now. She summoned her bayard to her hand. 

Lance watched the corridor, waiting for something to move. Keith kept his eyes on the sentries that were beyond Allura's vision. She stood their, waiting patiently. 

Every step they took seemed to echo into the entire facility around them. She was scared for a moment that sentries were flooding the hallways, but pushed the thought away. 

Lance dove out from his spot and fired two shots. Allura heard a loud clang as they both hit the floor. Keith ran around the corner after that and a second clang confirmed their safety. 

The two remaining paladins followed Keith as he darted down the hall, leaving the destroyed sentries on the ground. Ahead was a door with a recognizable symbol on it: the emblem of the Galra Empire. 

"Allura, go in their with Pidge and get control of the room. Lance and I'll hold the door if more sentries come." Keith ordered, keeping up his speed.

Lance frowned, trying to keep pace with Keith. "Why am I stuck with you?!" 

"Because what are you and I gonna do in that room?" 

Lance looked as if he were going to bark back, but kept his mouth shut. 

Keith and Lance slowed pace once they'd gotten near the door, letting Pidge and Allura run past them. The two stayed behind them and readied their weapons. 

Pidge stopped in front of the door. It was dark gray steel with the same glowing purple Galra symbol on it. "Okay, Allura, I'll handle the sentries, if there are any. You go for any Galra."

Allura nodded. Pidge held her bayard close and ran towards the doors. They opened automatically into the familiar sight of the Galra's typical control room. Allura already knew the layout and most likely where everyone was standing.

She threw the whip of her bayard out to her right, latching onto something she couldn't see. The initial sounds of panic from the Galra picked up and she heard a few shots go off. She pulled her target towards her, unable to see what it was. She threw her leg up and kicked it as it came flying towards her, sending the shattered parts of its mechanical body flying. A sentry. 

She turned her gaze around the room again and saw Pidge standing over her own dead sentry. Allura threw her whip forward again, latching onto the Galra standing near the control panel mounted into the center of the room. They screamed as Allura threw them down onto the floor, knocking them out instantly. 

Sentries behind the terminal fired, but Pidge had already deployed her barrier, deflecting the bullets. She charged forward and yelled as her body crashed into one of the sentries, pinning it to the floor.

"Pidge, what are you doing?!" Allura was concerned with Pidge's strange tactic. But went ahead to deal with the remaining sentry while Pidge wasn't paying attention. She smacked the sentry with her whip, almost cutting it in half and sending it sprawling across the room. 

"I'm fighting a sentry, can you help me?!" Pidge yelled, repeatedly trying to thrust her bayard into the sentry. But every time she tried, the sentry squirmed and moved its head, firing off a few bullets every time. The gun was aimed towards the ceiling. 

Allura ran forward and smashed her foot down on the sentry's head. It shattered and the sentry stopped moving immediately. She sighed and glared at Pidge.

"Thanks..." Pidge stood up, kicking the bits of sentry off her boots. 

"What was that?" Allura put her hands on her hips and stared down at the Green Paladin. Her suit was tainted a strange blue because of the lighting. 

"Well, uh.... I dunno, I wanted to try something new." Pidge tapped her hands together. 

"We can try something new when we're not infiltrating a Galra prison. Like in the training room. Pidge, that was very risky and you could've been hurt." 

"I-I know, Princess... I'm sorry." Pidge looked down at Allura's shoes, wallowing in her self pity. 

"Thank you." Allura sighed. "Now, did you see anything else in here?"

"No, you didn't!" 

Allura and Pidge spun around and were met with a gun pointed at them. There was a Galra commander behind the trigger. He was frowning at the two, his yellow eyes a clear example. 

Before he could react, however, Pidge and Allura had already deployed their shields and unsheathed their bayards. The Galra took a step back. 

"Lay down your weapon." Allura ordered. "We won't hurt you." 

"No way." They glared. 

"You're outnumbered and you have nowhere to run!" Pidge barked. "Now put down your weapon!"

"What are you doing here?! Why would the paladins of Voltron attack this base of any?"

"I'd think the answer is simple... This place isn't on a map, it's too suspicious." Pidge muttered. "Now stop stalling for time, just tell us what this facility is for." 

Allura watched their posture. It was stiff and scared, and one of their legs was shaking. Their purple, fluffy ears were twitching atop their head, but the yellow gaze would not let up. 

"I won't tell you." They muttered. 

"You've no choice. Tell us or we're interrogating you." Allura commanded. She locked eyes with the Galra.

They didn't move for a moment, but slowly lowered their gun. Allura and Pidge began to lower their weapons as well, but refused to put them away. Their legs began to shake just a little more and their ears lowered. 

"I've been watching over this facility for... many months." They explained. "Ever since.... Emperor Zarkon was attacked by Voltron... defeated by Voltron."

Allura and Pidge glanced at each other, theories already developing between them. 

"We were given a list.... and were told to gather those people and imprison them. We weren't to bring any battleships or squadrons... Just find them and bring them here."

"Who ordered you to do this?" Allura asked.

They didn't reply. They blinked a few times, but didn't change. Allura was still wary for the gun in their hand.

"Need I repeat myself?!" She barked.

"I cannot tell you." 

Pidge's eyes narrowed. "You're gonna have to."

"I.... I will not tell you, ever." They looked back up at the two paladins, defeat in their eyes. "We were ordered.... never to leave this facility. For leaving meant we could... be interrogated... by you."

Their legs were shaking much more now, along with their hands. The gun clattered around between their fingers. Their strained way of speech was setting Allura on edge. 

"What's going on here, in this facility?!" Pidge yelled. She almost dropped her weapons entirely. "What is it that we can't know about?!"

"You're not allowed to know, of course!" A smile broke out on their face. "You're never going to know!"

"We're bringing you in for interrogation if you refuse to tell us." Allura said. "Now put down the weapon!"

"Alright then, Princess. If you say so." Their breathing was very fast and their entire body was shivering with fright. In one quick second, they lifted the gun back up and aimed. Allura and Pidge brought their shields back up, completely protecting themselves. 

A shot was fired. Pidge and Allura took two steps back as their body hit the floor. The gun fell away from the side of their head, leaving a scorch mark on their temple. 

Pidge's eyes widened, staring at the body. She began to shake as well. "Oh my gosh...."

Allura was horrified at the sight. Blood was already beginning to spill from the wound. But she kept her composure, putting away her bayard and shield. She grabbed Pidge, who was too shocked to move, much less take her eyes off the corpse.

"Pidge, look at me." Allura knelt down to make eye contact with the Paladin. She pulled Pidge's head away from the body, forcing her scared eyes to look at Allura. "It's okay, Pidge. You and I are safe."

Pidge shivered in Allura's comforting grasp. She threw herself forward into Allura's arms, smacking their chest plates together. She put her head into her shoulder, but didn't make any noise.

Allura glanced back at the body, wincing at the sight of the puddle. Pidge was far too young to handle such a sight. "Come on, we'll go find Lance and Keith."

"H-he died..." Pidge muttered. Allura knelt down and picked up Pidge's bayard. She nudged Pidge along, her legs moving without her mind's consent. "He killed... himself, why did he-?"

"Pidge, it's okay." Allura continued guiding the young human forward, towards the door. "We don't need to worry about it." Pidge's feet were light on the ground, she clearly hadn't her mind on her walking. She stumbled a few times, but Allura's grip kept her off the floor.

Allura had been silently begging for one of the other paladins to walk through the door, and Lance was her savior. His blue armor was struck with purple with the lighting in the room. He walked through the door with calmness, and was smiling lightly to himself. 

"I told you I could make that shot."'

Keith, who was only a few feet behind Lance, pulled the hood off his head and removed his mask, revealing a cold glare. "You haven't given me too many reasons to take that to heart."

"This better not be about me trying to kick that orb again."

"Lance..." Allura muttered. The boy turned back to Allura and noticed Pidge in her arms. He instantly put away the gun and knelt down to Pidge.

"Hey, you okay?" He grabbed both her arms lightly. Pidge averted her gaze, her eyes unblinking. Lance looked up to Allura. "What... happened?"

Allura lowered her eyes and turned around to look back at the body. Keith had already taken notice, staring at the bleeding corpse. He looked upset, but not sick like Pidge. "A firefight..." He muttered.

"Not even..." Allura sighed. "We were going to interrogate him.... but then he went and-" She stopped talking. Lance got off his knees and noticed the body.

"Oh my gosh..." He uttered. "He... he did that to himself?"

"Yes." Allura answered. 

There was a stiff silence, only broken by the shuffling of their clothes as they began to situate themselves in the room. Pidge was stiff as a plank, not moving even an inch. Keith went to work on the terminal, attempting to get through the system. Allura motioned only with her hands for Lance to join her in looking for something to cover the body. 

The two had eventually found a tarp hidden in one of the closets of the room. They laid it over the body, covering the ever growing pool of blood. Lance looked un-phased, but Allura was certain he was shaken by the sight. Allura wasn't new to seeing death. She was also older and more mature than the others. She wouldn't be so horribly off put like Pidge was now.

The Green Paladin did little movement than hug her knees on the floor. She didn't weep nor make any other sounds. She just sat there, keeping her face hidden behind her armored limbs. No one wanted to tell her that she was needed to hack the terminal. 

Lance was already onto what Allura was going to do. He sat down next to Pidge and muttered something to her. Pidge didn't reply. He then nudged her shoulder, hoping to get some sort of response. Pidge didn't reply.

He pulled an arm over her shoulder and hugged her lightly, saying something again. Allura stayed away from the two, not wishing to intrude. Lance knew her much better than she. He'd know good ways to get Pidge moving again.

Pidge started to lift her head on occasion. She'd look at Lance for a moment, then back at her feet. He'd say something again, and this time, she'd nod. He stood up and helped her back up to her feet. Pidge turned back to the terminal and said, "Okay, let's get to work."

Allura watched Pidge work, almost amazed by the sudden mood change. But she already knew Pidge was a stubborn and hard-working child. It was no wonder she was capable of such.

Within seconds, Pidge found the map for the facility. "Yeah, that prisoner was right... The whole place is a just a pentagon of cells." 

"Is it possible to unlock them all from here?" Keith asked.

Pidge typed furiously on the board. "I mean, yeah. But we gotta get the sentries cleared or they'll just recapture all the prisoners."

"We can do that." Lance said. He looked back to Allura for approval. She nodded towards his command. 

Keith and Lance picked themselves up and went back to the door. Allura stayed for a moment and took Pidge by the shoulder. "Be sure to tell us if you find anything."

Pidge smiled and gave Allura a reassuring nod. Allura turned away from her friend and took off after Keith and Lance.

"This is Pidge, we have control of the facility." Her voice sounded over their radios. "Anyone at the castle hear?"

Hunk's kind voice spoke. "You're clear. Were you guys spotted?"

"I mean... kinda, but we took care of it."

"What do you mean, 'took care of it'?" Shiro asked.

"It doesn't matter, all of the Galra stationed here can't send out any messages, we're fine." Pidge sounded slightly annoyed. "At any rate, we might need to bring down the other lions. It looks like there's a lot of people here than need get-aways." 

"That's a bit risky, Pidge..." Keith muttered. 

"We have control of the facility, what can they do now?" She smirked to herself. 

"Send reinforcements..." Hunk muttered.

"All the more reason for you guys to get them out of there as fast as possible." Shiro said. "If there are sentries guarding the area, you need to take them out and escort as many prisoners as you can before more come along."

Allura stopped in her tracks, leaving Keith and Lance to run ahead. "W-what?!"

"Is that a problem?" Shiro asked.

"Why not just get rid of ALL the sentries and get everyone out at once? It minimizes risk!"

"Allura, we don't have time to worry about that. Just be ready to get them out of the building." 

Lance had already stopped and looked back at Allura. They made eye contact for a moment, both clearly understanding Shiro's frustration. He was right but at the same time, Allura wished he wasn't.

Lance waited for her to catch up and began again at her side. He didn't say anything, but Allura felt a little better knowing he was there. 

They turned the corner and Keith was standing over two destroyed sentries. He glanced back and made a hand motion for them to continue past them. He turned back to watch their flank. Lance and Allura readied their bayards, hearing the thumping of the sentries just ahead.

Lance dove forward and rolled, firing off two shots while doing so. The pair of sentries down the left corridor fell against the floor and sparked. He stopped rolling and caught sight of his achievement, and fist-pumped to himself.

As Lance celebrated his victory, Allura ran down the right corridor, holding her barrier high. The lone sentry shot at her, but its bullets were useless. Lance hadn't even noticed the sentry, leaving Allura to take care of it. She threw her whip towards its metal body, cutting it horizontally across its torso. The ethereal blade swept through its systems with a clean swipe. She brought the whip up again and smashed the tip of it down on the sentry, sending its crippled body into the floor. 

Allura huffed and her whip retracted into her bayard. She looked back at Lance, who had straggled up to his feet and stood attentive. His face was red underneath the blue glass on his helmet. 

Allura narrowed her gaze, almost unimpressed by his squeamishness. She didn't want to compliment herself, but she knew Lance had a lot to learn about proper fighting, especially if he was to use a broad sword. 

"Pidge, can you see us on any video cameras?" Keith asked. "The sentries in this sector are clear."

"Yeah, I'm on it. The doors should be opening..... now."

The cell nearest to Allura, some 5 feet behind her, began to open. The door slid up into the wall, allowing who ever was behind its wall to be freed. 

Keith had already taken to helping someone out. He took a shorter than he figure with bright green eyes and long yellow tendrils on their head. They were wearing tattered prison attire, much like many other prisoners had worn in the past months.

"Are... are you saving us?" They looked up at Keith with confusion.

Keith stared down at them and said, "Yes. We are." He looked up to Allura. "Princess, you and Lance get them to the Red Lion. I'll work on the next sector."

Keith looked distraught with the idea, but didn't speak against what Shiro had said. Allura sighed and silently agreed. The small blue alien came up behind Allura and followed her. Lance held his bayard's weapon in his hands and he ushered other figures along. There were too many with too many details for Allura to recognize any of them.

Allura let Lance take the lead, as he had the most range with his gun. He'd be able to take out any sentries that came from the front. Allura stayed in the back, ushering the slower prisoners along. There were maybe 20 in this sector alone. 

"Shiro, I'm not sure that we're going to be able to get them all out of here..." Allura reported. She stared down the hallway behind them, carefully listening for the sentries' footsteps.

"You're gonna have to take groups at a time. We can't risk leaving anyone behind."

Allura agreed with his command silently. She didn't want to make any more noise. Her legs moved her after the group, towards the front entrance. 

"Your next sector is clear. I'm moving up again and sending more prisoners your way." Keith reported. The static on his end was muffled, making his words slur. 

"Hey, uh, Keith?" Pidge asked.

"What is it?"

"The sector after that one, does it look any different from the previous ones?"

Allura kept trail with her party, listening to the conversation. She was already growing suspicious.

A few seconds passed and Keith muttered, "Yeah... it does."

"Okay, is there like a giant prison block near the end of the hallway?"

"You have video cameras, don't you?" Lance chided.

"Not in that sector and I don't know why."

"They must be holding someone extra special in there.... Pidge, unlock that door."

"We don't know what kind of security measures they have set in place, be careful." Shiro said.

Keith grumbled to himself over the radio. Allura and Lance had reached the entrance. She heard a few gun shots and the thump of metal bodies hit the floor, indicating that Lance had successfully handled a patrol. 

"As much as I wanna break down that door, he's right. The lock on that door is all manual, I'd need to be down there to get it open." Pidge said.

"Hold on, I'll be right there." Allura said. She turned heel and began to run back down the hall. "Lance, you can handle them by yourself right?"

"I-I can what?" He stuttered, nervous. 

"Just take them to the Red Lion. We'll join you as soon as we're done."

Allura had already departed, but Lance remained stagnant, unmoving at the entrance to the prison. He looked down at the small blue alien with the yellow tendrils. They looked like giant hoops on their head. He smiled nervously, intimidated by their eyes. 

Allura skid around a corner, leaving dust in her wake. Three sentries turned on the dime in front of her and shot. Her eyes widened.

Allura dropped down, underneath the bullets, sliding on the floor underneath one of the sentries. She grabbed its leg and pulled it down. Two feet behind her remaining foes, she stood back up and hurled the sentry by the leg at them. The three collided and crashed into the ground. Allura released her whip on their circuits and fried them. 

She turned again and kept running. The encroaching footsteps ahead worried her that she'd found another sentry and she had readied her whip. But the green color scheme let her lower her stance.

"Okay, where are we going?" Pidge swung her bayard down, releasing sentry debris from the blade. She stared up at Allura for direction.

"Come, this way." The Altean princess led her fellow paladin down the corridor, passing the previous sector. They skipped the second and descended upon the third, spotting Keith's glowing uniform at the end of the strange hallway.

Allura slowed her pace and took in the environment. She stared at the walls, noticing how bare they were, aside from the purple aesthetic lights. There were no cells or extra doors of any kind. This cell was just all on its own. 

"Pidge, come help me." Keith motioned for her to come closer with his hand. Pidge ran up behind him and looked at the control panel. She was eye level with it while Keith had to crouch down to look. 

"Uh.... crud. This doesn't look like Galra technology." Pidge furrowed her eyebrows and stared at it. "I mean, I can try, but I don't know..."

Allura walked up to the doors. They were dark grey with small indents in them. The indents looked like holes you would put in a cage so the animal inside could breathe. She knocked on the door, creating a loud echo inside the cage.

"Hello? Can you hear me?" She yelled into the cell. Keith looked up from the control panel that Pidge was working on. Allura banged again and asked, "Is there anyone in there?"

Pidge sighed loudly and muttered, "I have no idea how to work this." She kept frantically typing on the panel, hoping that it would pop open the door automatically.

Keith looked back at it. "Would it help if we got your computer or something?"

"I mean, we can try, sure." Pidge shrugged. She knocked her hand on the door and said, "Hey, sorry, whoever's in there. We gotta go get some supplies to break you out."

Pidge stared at the door, expecting some sorta reply. But no such reply came. She raised one eyebrow.

"What... are they holding in there?" Keith asked.

"Something important..." Allura muttered her answer. She looked at the control panel that Pidge was stood near. "Let me see, maybe I can do something."

Pidge stepped back and Allura crouched down to look at the panel. She carefully examined it, eyeing every piece closely. She was so caught up that she didn't hear the thumping of sentries behind her.

Keith looked down the hall and said, "Princess, can you hurry...?"

Allura began to connect the dots. She'd seen this particular panel somewhere before. It looked too familiar, too much like something she could understand. There were no symbols of any sort on it, no hand scanners. Just a single small hole in the wall with tendrils breaking out of it. Of course she'd seen it somewhere before. Her father had one.

"This is.... this is the lock used for Altean weapons." She stared at it with marvel. "They were used to keep priceless Altean technologies safe. Only a select few Alteans could open them."

"Altean technology? Why haven't I seen it before?" Pidge asked.

"Ah, that's because we've no major secrets to keep on the Castle of Lions, number five." Coran reported. "Well, aside from the Black Lion. But that was a much harder lock to crack." 

"Well, what opens this one?" Keith asked. He looked to Allura for explanation.

"I'm... not sure. Coran?" 

"I wouldn't know, Princess. I was only your father's royal adviser."

Allura looked back at the lock. All it had was a single hole in the wall, nothing else special about it. Allura ushered herself to think about what would be needed to open it. Did Alteans have any special sort of key that looked like this? No, that would be too easy to find. What had she seen when her father went to open them? Nothing, she hadn't seen her father open the lock, just the image of his back as it swung. 

But whenever he went to open the door, and Allura peaked around the corner to catch him, he'd flinch. Every time, he'd flinch for just a moment. And then the door would light up, and it'd swing open. Why did he flinch? What could make him flinch?

Allura took her mind out of the memory and stared at the lock again. She look at her hand, covered in the gray material used for the paladins' suits. The material was dense, protecting every inch of her body. She moved her hand towards the lock.

Instead of placing her hand on the wall, like a hand scanner, she put one of her fingers in the lock. It only took a second for the lock to detect something in the chamber and it reacted. Something pricked her finger, through the dense material of the suit, and caused her pain. It wasn't intense, but a small prick. Allura flinched and narrowed her eyes.

Keith reacted quickly and raised a hand to ask if she was okay.

"It's nothing. I'm fine." Allura replied before he'd gotten the chance to. Whatever needle had pricked her finger quickly released. Allura pulled her hand free from the lock. The small black dot on her finger tip was a very dark tint of red. 

"Altean lifeblood detected. Royal family descent. Access granted."

Allura looked back up at the lock. The tendrils on the lock began to glow a bright pink. She hadn't seen it before, but they were wrapped around the entrance to the cell as well. The entire frame lit up with a neon pink hue, almost blinding the paladins. Allura raised her hand to guard her eyes, but adjusted to the light quickly. 

The break in the doors began to separate from each other, one side retracting up and the other down. The inside of the cell was illuminated with the pink light, revealing its dark interior.

There was no bunk or any sort of addition to the cell like some others had. The three didn't see anyone inside at first glance, but as the door finally retracted completely they did find a body on the floor.

Pidge stared down at the body, and Allura was afraid that she had frozen up again after seeing another corpse. Allura's eyes adjusted and she was able to make out shades of bright white and dark black on the body. They had a humanoid figure.

Keith brought himself forward and stared down at the body. "S-Shiro, do you see this??"

"What? No, what's in there?" Shiro asked from the castle, clearly confused.

"Is this some kind of joke?" Allura asked, paralyzed by the sight. Keith bent down to the body and turned it over.

"Guys, what's in there?" Shiro asked again.

"Your..." Pidge was at a loss for words. She swallowed her sentence and caught a full glimpse of their face. "I'm.... not sure, but..."

"What is this???" Keith asked, staring at their face. The three paladins were utterly confused at the sight.

If he was still in the Castle of Lions, what was Shiro doing here, in this prison cell, asleep and unresponsive? Allura couldn't answer. No one could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ehghhehhehe i really hate cliff hangers but yeah there you go, have fun developing your theories


End file.
